Talk:pickled onion

RFD discussion: February–March 2020
Is this SOP? The bit about it being a common bar food seems non-lexical. Other pickled (bar or other) foods include pickled pigs' feet and pickled olives. (See also pickled egg: is that SOP too?) - -sche (discuss) 07:38, 12 February 2020 (UTC)
 * My comment above was a question rather than a clear delete !vote, because I was kind of on the fence, but at this point I do think this should be deleted. - -sche (discuss) 22:03, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I would say it is SOP, really the only non-SOP pickled item I can think of is a, which is a pickled cucumber. I have pickled garlic and pickled beets on the shelf right now. - TheDaveRoss  13:45, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * On second thought, keep, I forgot about . - TheDaveRoss  13:22, 18 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Hmm, but does this actually pass that test? Just being a food is not enough: what part of the definition goes beyond "pickled" + "onion"? The IMO non-lexical detail that it can be found, but certainly not exclusively, in bars? The claim that it's pickled specifically in vinegar? AFAICT that's partly wrong and partly an attribute of "pickled". Or do we want entries for pickled cucumber, pickled olive (pickled black olive) and every other pickled food? - -sche (discuss) 17:14, 18 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I guess my view is that if fried egg is somehow lexical then so is pickled onion. In my book fried egg is not a lexical unit, even though it is most commonly fried in a particular way and an egg of a particular animal, it isn't always either of those things. If we have determined that fried egg merits inclusion then I can't see enough of a difference to exclude pickled onion. - TheDaveRoss  21:39, 18 February 2020 (UTC)
 * So, can I add all the other pickled things, too, like pickled pigs' feet, pickled black olives and other pickled olives, pickled green beans and other pickled beans, pickled corn, pickled grapes, pickled pears, etc? (And what about a pickled brain, pickled penis, etc?) - -sche (discuss) 21:56, 18 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Delete. As I understand it, the fried egg rule is not because it is food, but because there are restrictions on what constitutes a "fried" egg that do not match all the ways one commonly fries eggs. Specifically, a "scrambled" egg is fried, but is not called a "fried egg". This does not apply to pickled onions. Usually, a pickled onion is either a or the spicy pickled red onions one finds in salsa bars. However, any onion one pickles is called a pickled onion - that is, the term is not restricted to the more common forms, the way fried egg is restricted. Kiwima (talk) 21:38, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Delete, SOP. Canonicalization (talk) 09:12, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Keep as a type of food. I'm not terribly keen on them, but they are probably regarded as a delicacy. DonnanZ (talk) 09:58, 18 February 2020 (UTC)
 * In BrE, "pickled onion" is a highly debatable case, in my opinion. Yes, it is an onion that is pickled, but also it has a place in the cuisine or culture of the country far beyond what is true for e.g. "pickled olive" or "pickled bean". Mihia (talk) 00:14, 22 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Not in any traditional lemming: . Seems to be a sum of parts so if it is to be kept, there has to be a redeeming property. --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:57, 22 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete... This is certainly a commonly pickled food and Brits know what it is, and they know they can be found behind the bar, just above the Scampi Fries and below the Glenfiddich; but it's still just an onion that has been pickled; there's no magic about it, and no special meaning. I am mainly posting here to tell you that -sche has gone totally mad and created pickled olive and pickled black olive (because we don't have Wikipedia's WP:GAME policy) and he is now standing on the roof of the Beer Parlour with a spud gun. Equinox ◑ 06:27, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Delete, and I have nominated -sche's (seemingly bad-faith) creations mentioned by Eq. The "but it's a food" reasoning is patently stupid. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 06:33, 25 February 2020 (UTC)


 * I think a question that we can ask ourselves is whether there is any type of onion that has been pickled that would not be a pickled onion in the commonly understood British sense. Somewhere in the combination of size, type, pickling method, packaging, presentation, serving etc., I think the answer to this question is probably yes, implying that the common British sense is something more than purely sum-of-parts. Whether this is enough to save the entry, I'm not so sure. It may be the case that a variety of ostensibly SoP foodstuff terms have usual local forms in various places, but listing all of these could be beyond the scope of any dictionary. Mihia (talk) 20:07, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I suspect that most (and I know that some) of the restrictions go (a) beyond this collocation, and even (b) beyond the scope of what is lexical. For example, the same restrictions apply if you say you've just gotten some onions which you were going to pickle and some brine/vinegar to pickle them with. Restrictions also apply if a recipe for a pasta sauce or fajitas or something calls for "1 onion, diced": a reader will infer that a very tiny onion the size of a spring onion is not meant, and may also infer that some (e.g. sweet) kinds of onion may not be meant. (Btw, I did not initially RFD pickled egg, precisely because it claims that it is restricted to hen's eggs, but I suspect it too is SOP and the restriction is on egg: if a recipe calls for "2 large eggs", a reader will infer to add hen's/chicken's eggs, not ostrich eggs, although these are large eggs.) - -sche (discuss) 22:00, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
 * It could be a question of what type of onion is pickled. They always seem to be small, larger than a spring onion, but not whopping big onions. DonnanZ (talk) 09:31, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Delete. There is no British sense. The recipes one finds for pickled onions, in English, do not go beyond what one expects from the concept of pickling, and are the same as for Russian-language recipes for маринованный лук, and the resulting cans and whole onions look the same. Fay Freak (talk) 14:19, 1 March 2020 (UTC)


 * There are 6 2 in favour of keeping, and 2 6 in favour of deletion, so this is RFD-deleted. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 22:17, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
 * , FYI, the vote tallies are reversed (the conclusion is correct). - TheDaveRoss  14:00, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Fixed. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 16:46, 23 March 2020 (UTC)