edible onion shoots?

Factual Questions
1

A few months ago we had an onion that we got from the market that started growing shoots out of it. We watched it grow for a bit, not even bothering to do anything like water it, and it just kept growing and growing. Finally I said “what the heck” and planted it in our garden outside.

It continued to grow. It shot probably three feet in the air with the shoot at least an inch to an inch and a half in diameter at its base. At the top it started flowering this big bushy bundle of white flowers.

Today I went outside and noticed that some bastardly rabbit must have chewed through its base because the thing was lying on the ground all sad and lonely looking. I took it inside, and cut a foot and a half piece out of its shoot. It’s a firm hollow tube that smells of onion.

So all of this is just a really long way of asking a really really stupid question: can I eat this? I mean, what do I do with an 18 inch tube of onion?

2

Onions flower during their second year. They tend to be a bit more bitter, and a lot tougher than during their first year. The big onion bulb is a food storage system, and consequently contains a lot of sugars. The stem is a leaf. No, they are not poisonous.

Tris

3

it can be eaten, though it is not always good. bulb onions when young have flavorful stems and you can eat when thinning the crop. when a bulb onion is flowering the stem is less tender. you could chew it if you like onion flavor or chop into little bits for garnish, though other things would be better flavor like chives.