What does the benefits of having onions in your socks do for a cough and cold?

This is perhaps one of the strangest sock orientated things that we have heard here at Sock Snob, putting onions in your socks. But then again, in this day and age it could be considered as quite a normal practice! It is derived from folk remedy that if you slice the skin and the rounded areas of the onion and put them on the bottom of your feet then you will be cured of your cough and cold. This is of course whilst you are sleeping, otherwise it might be quite uncomfortable walking around with bits of onions in your socks.

This remedy can be traced back to historical sources that mention that onions were used during the bubonic plague to draw out the poisonous infections. As onions are rich in sulphates (great to help for a cough and cold), it means that they can infiltrate the body more effectively. This allows for the blood to be purified, possibly one of the many benefits of having onions in your socks.

​The ancient greeks even fed raw onions to athletes that were competing in the olympic games, and gladiators were even massaged with onions just as they were about to fight in the arena. The roman army even consumed onions as they supposedly gave them strength according to the national geographic. Onions were even used in Chinese medicinal foot reflexology.

​If you surf the web you will find a plethora of bloggers telling you that they swear by this remedy. They could be right, in the sense that onions have many rich qualities in them and that putting onions in your socks whilst at asleep means these qualities can get to work during the night. But despite this, there has been little to no scientific research into whether onions do actually cure a cough and a cold, despite what past advocates suggest.

So, until any experiment has been conducted on this rather strange method then no one can really suggest whether it is worth doing or not. It seems to be a case of the placebo effect taking place for the people it does work for. If you believe it works then it probably is helping you recover from your cough or cold. Onions are probably better for you if you actually consume them, rather than wear them as a foot accessory. If you want our advice, wear comfy warm socks to bed, not ones filled with onions.