Sweet Onion

Sweet Onion appears in 54 indexed US food products. No FDA SAFFA status or CSPI rating is attached in this snapshot, so this page reports prevalence rather than a safety verdict.

What the data can answer

Sweet Onion appears in 54 catalogued products, but this snapshot has no FDA SAFFA status or CSPI Chemical Cuisine rating attached to it. This page therefore cannot answer whether the ingredient is safe from those sources. It can show how often it occurs, where it tends to sit on labels, and which kinds of products contain it.

54
catalogued products
#4,732
usage rank of 247,206
21
named brands represented
51%
average depth down ingredient lists

Catalog prevalence comes from Open Food Facts ingredient lists. FDA SAFFA and CSPI Chemical Cuisine labels are shown only when the source record contains them.

How to use this page

Separate this ingredient from its product neighborhood

This is a mixed product neighborhood: 15 of 54 records have some flagged component, while the rest do not. Compare Apple & Walnut Salad with Chicken; apple and walnut salad; Apple Cheddar to see how surrounding formulations change; do not assign their 80–100 score range to Sweet Onion itself. The ingredient most often sits in the lower half of the list, and Salted-snacks supplies the most useful like-for-like starting point for a label review.

15 of 54 linked records have some flagged component

All 52 NOVA-classified records cluster most heavily in Group 4, while the first-category labels split across several shelves. That makes the 80–100 score spread more informative than the average alone: investigate the low end, identify the actual flagged row, and compare it with a similar unflagged formulation before drawing a conclusion.

Next check: pair one flagged product with a similar unflagged product from the same shelf category.

Sweet Onion sits in the busiest tenth of the catalog (#4,732 / 247,206)

Usage rank
#4,732
of 247,206 ingredients that appear in at least one catalogued product, tied with 46 others that also appear in exactly 54 products, listed in more products than 98.1% of them.
Typical depth in an ingredient list
51%
Of the way down the captured list, averaged across the 54 products listing it (mean slot 16.0). Sweet Onion usually falls in the lower half of the list; this position does not measure its amount because source formatting, compound ingredients and labeling exceptions vary.

Derived by this site from the ingredient lists of every catalogued product (Open Food Facts), recomputed on each data refresh. 247,206 ingredients have at least one appearance and are ranked here. Usage and list position describe prevalence, not safety.

What else is usually in the same product as Sweet Onion

Across the 54 products on this site that list Sweet Onion, these flagged additives appear alongside it most often. The comparison column is how often each one appears across every product with a parsed ingredient list, so the two figures are measured over the same set. Sodium Nitrite shows up about 5.4x more often with Sweet Onion than in the catalogue at large.

Sodium Nitrite: +10.6ppSodium Nitrite+10.6ppCarrageenan: +8.5ppCarrageenan+8.5ppCaramel Coloring: +5.4ppCaramel Coloring+5.4pp
Percentage-point gap vs the catalogue baseline rate for each additive, Sweet Onion products only. Source: Open Food Facts ingredient lists.
Chart values as text

Unit: percentage points above/below baseline. Data current as of September 2026.

Sodium Nitrite
10.6pp
Carrageenan
8.5pp
Caramel Coloring
5.4pp
Additive Shared products Share of Sweet Onion products Share of all products
Sodium Nitrite 7 13% 2.4%
Carrageenan 7 13% 4.5%
Caramel Coloring 6 11.1% 5.7%

Co-occurrence describes what manufacturers formulate together. It is not a claim that these additives interact, and it carries no regulatory meaning. Counted over products with parsed ingredient lists; Open Food Facts, 2026-09-01.

How do the sampled products compare?

Each point is one of the 16 sampled products listed below: its overall safety score against how many separately flagged ingredients its label carries. Bubble size is the number of ingredient rows the label actually resolved to.

Safety score vs. flagged-ingredient count for products containing Sweet Onion

Per-product safety score and flagged-ingredient count from the same sampled listings shown below. Bubble size = linked ingredient rows. Source: Open Food Facts labels x FDA SAFFA x CSPI Chemical Cuisine. 2×2 strategic matrix plotting 16 entities by Safety score (X) and Flagged ingredients on label (Y), with a crosshair dividing the plot into four quadrants. High score, still flaggedLow score, more flaggedHigh score, fewer flaggedLow score, fewer flagged 80859095100105 00.511.5 Safety score Flagged ingredients on label Safety score vs. flagged-ingredient count for products containing Sweet Onion
Per-product safety score and flagged-ingredient count from the same sampled listings shown below. Bubble size = linked ingredient rows. Source: Open Food Facts labels x FDA SAFFA x CSPI Chemical Cuisine.

Peer ingredients with comparable catalog mass (near “1/10 Of 1% Sodium Benzoate”)

Sweet Onion sits among other busy catalog rows (54 products, mean score 96.6/100). Catalog-mass neighbours in view: 1/10 Of 1% Sodium Benzoate; Annatto And Paprika Extract; Blueberry Bits. Count peers and score peers are listed separately on purpose.

Similar mean product score

Mean product-score neighbours (≥50 scored products), kept separate from the product-count peers above.

Using the Sweet Onion evidence

54 product rows plus any FDA/CSPI fields on Sweet Onion are the evidence base — drill into the listings that matter for your decision.

  • Check the listed products containing Sweet Onion before treating the aggregate count as a personal conclusion. Open product sample
  • Compare Sweet Onion with a peer such as “1/10 Of 1% Sodium Benzoate” on source-backed rating, FDA status, and product footprint. Compare a peer
  • Read how PlainFoodSafe joins source records before treating a screening label as a personal food or health conclusion. Read the methodology

This page describes published source classifications and product-label coverage. It is not dietary, allergy, or medical advice.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does Sweet Onion carry its own safety label in this catalog?

This is a mixed neighborhood: some linked products carry a separate flag while others do not. This snapshot does not attach a standalone FDA/CSPI verdict to Sweet Onion. Compare like-for-like products before treating the average screening score as an ingredient verdict.

Which product shelves show up most often with Sweet Onion?

Sweet Onion ranks in the top decile by product count (#4,732 of 247,206), appearing in 54 indexed products led by Salted-snacks. The sample list below is a slice of that footprint, not the full universe.

Why is Sweet Onion so common on ingredient lists?

The source record does not name a technical effect, yet Sweet Onion appears in 54 products (#4,732 usage rank). High prevalence here describes formulation frequency, not an approved use level.

Regulatory status: FDA SAFFA (Sweet Onion). Safety ratings: CSPI Chemical Cuisine; product presence: Open Food Facts via PlainFoodSafe (September 2026). Figures are computed from those sources, no editor-typed counts. Methodology · State regulations.