Many plants in the genus Allium are known by the common name onion but, used without qualifiers, it usually refers to Allium cepa. Allium cepa is also known as the garden onion or 'bulb' onion and 'shallot'.
Origin and distribution
Allium cepa is known only in cultivation, but related wild species occur in Central Asia. The most closely-related species include Allium vavilovii Popov & Vved. and Allium asarense R.M. Fritsch & Matin from Iran.Grubben, G.J.H. & Denton, O.A. (2004) Plant Resources of Tropical Africa 2. Vegetables. PROTA Foundation, Wageningen; Backhuys, Leiden; CTA, Wageningen. However Zohary and Hopf warn that "there are doubts whether the vavilovii collections tested represent genuine wild material or only feral derivatives of the crop."Daniel Zohary and Maria Hopf, Domestication of plants in the Old World, third edition (Oxford: University Press, 2000), p. 198
Uses
.]]Onions are available in fresh, frozen, canned, pickled, and dehydrated forms. Onions can be use
Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onions