onions

I think red clay is good for growing Vidalia onions.

But that just might be marketing! Walla Wallas are sweet onions, supposedly the same, just on a different coast.

We'll see how they turn out. I've bought 'sweet onions' that were no different than a basic yellow onion, and nothing like a Vidalia.

AvaDGardner wrote:I think red clay is good for growing Vidalia onions.

But that just might be marketing! Walla Wallas are sweet onions, supposedly the same, just on a different coast.

We'll see how they turn out. I've bought 'sweet onions' that were no different than a basic yellow onion, and nothing like a Vidalia.

Ava, I read (I think in Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle?) that the Vidalias can't be sold as such unless they're grown within a few counties of Vidalia, GA. It said the same is true of Walla Wallas and certain other varieties of vegetable.

Vidalia onions can only legally be called as such if grown in certain counties in Georgia

Vidalia Growing Regions

However you can grow the variety of onion they use in that region for "Vidalia" onions....the Yellow Granex Hybrid.

Walla Walla's do not currently enjoy a similar legal destination to Vidalias though and neither do Maui Onions...although they might in the future.

Anyway the situation with Vidalia Onions is similar to the various European Laws protecting regional designations of products like Champagne.

You can only legally call your wine Champagne in the EU if it is grown and produced in a specific restricted regions around Champagne, France....but as you probably noticed if your a wine lover it certainly make the exact same wine using the exact same methods and grape varieties and produce a sparkling wine that is every bit as good or even superior to the same wine made in France by a French Vineyard.

There is really nothing special about Vidalia onions other than the fact a particularly sweet variety of onions grown in a low sulfur soil.

It quite simple to grown onions just as sweet as any Walla Walla or Vidalia in a raised bed using the SFG method....just watch the sulfur content of your bed and grow a variety of onion that known to be sweet.

.....................awaits the angry mods of Georgians and Washingtonians.....