How to grow... Onion & Shallot
Rocket Growing Guides
You’ll find onions and shallots a really useful addition to your veg patch if only because we cook with them so frequently. Growing them with Rocket Gardens is much easier than growing from seed. You can either grow Rocket Gardens onions & shallots from sets, popped in the ground between Jan and Mar, or as seedlings to be planted out from late May to early June. Spring onions come as seedlings and can be planted in spring/summer and in autumn.
- Growing Advice
- Growing advice
- Chef's Corner
Give them a sunny spot
Choose a sunny, sheltered spot with moist (but not waterlogged!) soil.
Grow in beds or pots
Onions and shallots can be grown quite close together making them a good crop for pots and containers as well as for raised beds, planters and traditional veg patches. If growing in pots and containers, it is best to choose a flat base pot rather than one that tapers off.
How far apart?
10cm apart is enough, and spring onions can be squeezed in a little closer still.
Don't let them get too soggy
Waterlogged soil is not good for onions and shallots and can cause the bulbs to start rotting.
Looking after your plants....
Onions and spring onions grow relatively slowly, and the bulbs don’t tend to swell until the summer. Patience is a virtue!
Watering them
Water them regularly to keep the soil moist.
Weeding
Weed regularly because they are shallow rooting and slow growers, so you don’t want them to have too much competition.
Storage Tips
Once you have dug your onions up, let them dry out in the sun for a while. Once they are dry you can pop them into a netter bag and keep them in a cool, dark place.
Ways to cook
You won’t be short on dishes to cook using onions, they are the base of many a recipe!
