Medwyn Williams explains all about showing scallions
Green onions – or scallions – are popular on the show bench in Ireland
Ihaven’t shown any of my vegetables as yet, but I’ve judged a few shows and the best so far was the Tullamore Show in County Offaly, Ireland.
I’ve been judging this show for many years now and I’ve seen the standard getting better year on year. There’s no doubt that the prize money must attract the growers from all over Ireland as the first prize in every class is €25, with the collection of five kinds of vegetables having a first prize of €150.
The vegetable collection category is always well subscribed and the winner this year was Harold Lawlor. Harold is certainly a veteran grower, with all his family involved in the show. His son Martin had a field day in the dahlia classes and Harold’s grandson came second in the vegetable collection.
A class that always attracts some excellent entries is the one for scallions. This was a relatively new term for me when I first judged in Ireland, but it’s commonly used there. Green onions and scallions are actually the same thing. They’re either harvested very young from the regular bulb-forming onions we’re familiar with, or they can come from other varieties that actually never form bulbs. Scallions are long, with a white stem end that doesn’t bulge out. They’ve a mild bite that isn’t as intense as regular onions, with the white parts containing the most flavour. These were judged in accordance with the NVS Judges’ Guide and while there’s no mention of the word scallions in the book, there’s a section for ‘Onions – Green Salad’. They’re relatively easy to grow and are only awarded a maximum of 10 points.
If there’s a class at your local show for green salad onions then I’d recommend the variety ‘Guardsman’. This produces straight stick onions with the mildness of bulb onions. It’s vigorous, high yielding and matures in just 10 weeks from sowing.