Though recipes frequently use them interchangeably, shallots are a different beast from onions – and you can even use them in desserts

Let’s be clear: a shallot is not an onion. You could be forgiven for thinking they are the same, and substituting them for onions in a recipe. Very few recipe writers will specify shallots for this reason, myself included sometimes. It’s so much more convenient just to say “onion”.

Editors will say to me: “No one will know the difference, so why fuss?” But you should fuss, because shallots have a completely different flavour profile. Shallots are yin to the onion’s yang.

I grew up thinking shallots and onions were the same, too. In Thai, shallots were referred to as hohm. I should have realised something was up, as the literal translation is “fragrant”.

No one in their right mind would sniff a raw onion and call it fragrant. If you sniff a shallot, however, I could understand that. It’s still going to make your eyes water, but it is not as pungent. Shallots are more delicate and aromatically perfumed, much sweeter to eat raw.

Randy Moon, one of the “Four Horsemen” behind my favourite wine bar in NYC (with a killer menu, too) says onions are a crucial base note to dishes that require a long cooking time. Some of the world’s greatest dishes have onions as a starting point. Meanwhile, shallots are the top note.

“Everything in its place and a place for everything,” is what mise en place means, and that’s the motto for all self-respecting cooks and chefs. There’s a place for shallots, and a place for onions.

Use shallots raw in a salad and they will sing harmoniously with your other veg; use onions when making a stew. Shallots when you require finesse, onions when you need weight.

Shallots are in the allium family (Allium cepa, if we’re being pedantic) and look very much like onions. But, surprisingly, they’re more closely related to garlic than onions. Shallots grow like garlic, with clusters of offsets genetically identical to their mother bulb, whereas onions are a loner bulb, and easier to grow from seed.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest An onion. Unlike shallots, an onion grows as a single bulb. Photograph: Roman Tiraspolsky/Alamy

Shallots come in a few different forms. Most common in Australia are the French red eschallot. Long and tapered, they’re daintily pretty. Cuter still are the petite Asian shallots. They are clumpier and fiddlier to peel, but the extra sweat is worth it. Their colour varies from yellow to pinky grey to an eye-catching deep crimson.

In the last decade, they’ve become easier to find in Australia. The first time I came across them, my eyes bulged. It was at a Vietnamese-owned farm in Darwin, where massive piles were being cured. I bought as many as I could fit in my suitcase to take back to my kitchen in Sydney, where I gleefully used them in place of everything calling for an onion in Asian recipes.

Onions aren’t common in south and south-east Asian culinary traditions. When chefs and cooks come to Australia, where onions are plentiful, they sigh in relief. Peeling a box of onions is a walk in the park compared with peeling a box of itty bitty shallots. That’s why in restaurants, Asian ones included, you will nary see a shallot, even if it is traditionally called for. But don’t be put off from using them at home. The rewards are many.

Upon cooking, shallots excrete a lot less moisture than onions, which makes them a better choice to fry until crisp. You can buy them ready-fried in Asian grocers, but why not make it a Sunday afternoon meditative experience? The benefits of that session will be a hundredfold.

Store-bought fried shallots are often rancid, and fried using dubious sources of palm oil. Making it yourself, you can use a much better quality oil. My current obsession is macadamia oil, which has a fantastically high heating point and great health benefits too. Macadamia oil is rich in oleic acid and monounsaturated fatty acids, and it’s high in omegas three and six. When combined with the high levels of polyphenols and flavonoids (anti-oxidants) from the shallot, it’s practically a superfood flavour bomb.

Fried shallots are incredibly versatile. You can use them as a garnishing flourish on anything you like to finish a dish. Pasta, noodles, rice, soups, vegetables, meat … even dessert. Seriously.

That’s what Thais do. It’s not weird … not at all.

I used fried shallot recently in the dessert course of a dinner I cooked in New York, a royal cuisine dish called som chun: iced fresh fruit, perfumed with a floral aromatic syrup, bergamot, fresh ginger, sliced macadamias and finished with crisp fried shallots.

Try it this summer. It teeters on the balance between fresh sweetness from seasonal fruit and savoury flavour from the shallots.

Just don’t try it with onions. It wouldn’t be the same.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Fried shallots draining on paper towel. Photograph: Yuki Sugiura/The Guardian

Fried Shallots

6 shallots

500ml macadamia oil

Grey salt to season

Get into the zone, with nowhere to be but peeling and finely slicing the shallots. You don’t need to halve them before you slice, as once they fry up they will shrink.

On the highest element, heat the oil in wok or frying pan for about five minutes. Gently nudge the shallots into the oil and watch it bubble away. Turn down the heat to low-medium. Resist the urge to push it around for approximately five minutes.

Then get at it using a wooden paddle or spatula and stir the shallots around the pan constantly. Stand by the stove, focus on your breathing and inhale the smell of allium delight. If you don’t want your entire house to smell like shallots, I highly advise you to turn on the hood to the highest extraction and open your windows.

Once the shallots start to turn a golden brown, take them off the heat and drain into a steel mesh colander, lined with a few paper towels. Have a stainless steel bowl underneath the colander to catch all the oil. Cool the shallots down, then toss a teaspoon of salt into them. Stored in an airtight container, you can keep them refrigerated for up to six months.

Keep the oil separately in another jar and use it for salad dressings or as a finishing oil for absolutely anything and everything. These will become your favourite pantry staples. They are for me.