Pickled Onion Review #11: The Funky Food Co's Guinness Pickled Onions & Marmite Pickled Onions

Alright, you magnificent connoisseurs of all things pickled, let's get funky. After setting the benchmark with their "Dogs Bollocks" onions, it's time to dive into two of the flavoured offerings from my local Staffordshire heroes, The Funky Food Co. In fact, it was a jar of their Guinness onions that kick-started this whole ridiculous journey into reviewing pickled onions online. So, this feels like coming full circle.

On that note, I learned earlier this month that the current proprietor of The Funky Food Co is retiring in November. But thankfully, the business and, most importantly, the recipes for their products have been sold to another local owner, so supplies will keep coming. I wish both of them all the best.

Today, we're unjarring their Guinness Pickled Onions and their Marmite Pickled Onions.

The Funky Food Co's Marmite Pickled Onions

As a huge fan of the black stuff, I had high hopes for these, and they did not disappoint. The flavour is unmistakably Marmite; no surprise, given it's the second ingredient on the label. It gives the onions a huge umami hit, creating a fuller, more savoury flavour than you get from most standard pickled onions. Any Marmite fan will be a fan of these.

The vinegar sharpness isn't huge, but honestly, I can forgive them for that. The rich, savoury depth more than makes up for it, and it makes it a little too easy to eat them by the bucketload.

The Funky Food Co's Guinness Pickled Onions

The Guinness flavour here is more subtle. If it wasn't written on the jar, I doubt you'd be able to guess the extra ingredient. But that's not a criticism. It still gives them an excellent flavour twist, adding a combination of bitter and sweet notes, almost like a good 50-60% dark chocolate. I love these too; it's been a genuine struggle not to keep eating them by the spoonful.

The One Gripe...

And that brings me to my only real gripe with both of these excellent products: the size. They're silverskin onions. As I've said before, I just don't understand the obsession with using them for pickling. They're too small! There's no point bringing out the pickle fork for these; you'd spend ten minutes harpooning individual onions and hoofing them individually into your gob. No... these demand a dessert spoon. Shovel 'em in!

The Verdict

Both of these are absolutely top-tier flavoured onions. They're bold, interesting, and dangerously moreish.

The Funky Food Co's Guinness Pickled Onions - 4 onions out of 5
🧅🧅🧅🧅❌

The Funky Food Co's Marmite Pickled Onions - 4½ onions out of 5
🧅🧅🧅🧅🌗

The Marmite ones win out by a fraction simply because I'm such a huge Marmite fan. But let's be clear: both of these would have been our first 5-out-of-5 contenders if they were just bigger onions. I'm being picky, but that satisfying, substantial crunch is what separates the great from the legendary. Still, these are utterly brilliant.