Hanging an Onion Braid - How To Tie Off The End

by Karbyn Eilde

Braiding home-grown fresh onions is really pretty easy - check out complete instructions for that part here. What should you do once you reach the end, though? You'll need to get that tied off somehow, or else your braid will come undone and you won't be able to hang it up. One fast and easy way is just to put an elastic hair band around the end (see white onions in first photo) but using some binders twine to make a more secure end is worth the extra minute or two of your time. It holds better and looks better, too.

Don't be fooled by these step-by-step directions. The whole process only takes a minute or two, once you have practiced it a couple of times. All you need is some twine and scissors to cut it.

Step 1: Cut a piece of binder's twine about 10 inches long, and then lay it at the end of your onion braid, in a loop with a long tail.

Step 2: Bring the longer end of the twine over the shorter end. Be sure to leave a bit of open loop showing at the top.

Step 3: Wrap the twine around the top of the onion braid, being sure to wrap snugly (but not too tight) and keep the wraps close to each other. At the end, don't wrap all the way down - you'll need to leave a bit of twine showing at the bottom.

Step 4: Put the last bit of the long end back through the loop.

Step 5: Now use that long bit of the original loop (that you left unwrapped, remember?) and pull on that.

Step 6: When you pull on that, it will bring the original loop down and under the wrapped area, keeping it hidden and secured. Be careful during this step, because this is the moment when you can pull too hard and break off the whole end of the braid and then you'll have to start over.

Step 7: Now, bring the two ends of twine together and tie them together in a simple knot.

Step 8: For the last step, use that loop you just made to hang the onions over your garden trowel so you can take a photo to text to your friends...............or just take them inside to wherever you plan to hang them (a cool dry place) and hang them up for storage.

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