Rachael Ray’s Trick for Easily Chopping an Onion

If you grew up watching Rachael Ray like I did, then there are a few cooking lessons from this Food Network star that might have stayed with you over the years. You probably call extra virgin olive oil “EVOO,” and you might keep a “garbage bowl” on your countertop for collecting food scraps while cooking.

There’s one piece of advice from Ray that I and other home cooks still follow in the kitchen every week, even years after we first learned it. As one fan wrote on a recent Instagram post from the celebrity chef, “You taught me how to cut an onion 20 years ago.”

Ray’s method for cutting an onion has become somewhat iconic — she notes that “they call it the ‘Rachael Ray hack’” — because it removes a step that most professional chefs would include. While the cookbook author and chef doesn’t follow the exact same method for dicing an onion that you’d learn in culinary school, she does include one key part of the process that many home cooks overlook.

In other words, Ray’s method for chopping an onion strikes the right balance between professional technique and accessible skill, which is why it has remained popular among home cooks for well over a decade.

Don’t remove the root

This is where Ray aligns with her colleagues. To chop an onion, she begins by slicing it in half vertically from the root to the stem of the allium. Next, she cuts off the stem end of the onion on each half, leaving the roots attached to the other end. (To identify which end is which, look for the remnants of root fibers on one side. This is likely the slightly pointier end of the onion. The stem will only consist of tapered edges of the papery onion skin.)

Peel the dry skin off each half of the onion. This might be slightly more difficult with the root end still attached, but with a little tug you can remove it. Be sure to save any onion peels in the freezer for making stock at a later date.

Leaving the root attached to the onion will make your next step much easier. As you dice the allium, the root will hold it together, preventing pieces from slipping and making it easier to chop evenly as you get close to the end of the onion.

Rely on the natural layers of the onion

Most professional chefs — or at least those who trained at culinary schools, unlike Ray who learned solely by working in kitchens — will tell you to cut vertical and horizontal slices into each half of an onion before you’re ready to dice it.

This means you’re slicing in rows perpendicular to the root and then slicing horizontally, with the knife’s blade parallel to the cutting board, toward your hand. More simply, you’re creating a crosshatch pattern.

It’s this second step that Ray takes issue with. As she points out, why would you want to cut toward your hand? Instead, she relies on the natural layers of the onion for her horizontal slices. The celebrity chef makes those initial vertical cuts, then begins slicing off pieces from the open end, creating an even dice while skipping an unnecessary step.

Saving just one small step might not seem like much, but considering you chop an onion or shallot nearly every time you cook, the Rachael Ray method could be a big time saver.