He slammed the vegetable on the counter, proclaimed "I'm holding up the store with an onion" then "ranted and raved" as he smashed $5000-plus worth of stock.
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Just four months earlier, Michael Scannell inflicted another terrifying tantrum that didn't require an onion to unleash the tears.
"His anger management is out the window," Albury Local Court magistrate Richard Funston said on Wednesday.
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The 31-year-old - known for his court outbursts, capped-off with a slammed door on the way out - was outraged the electricity to his public housing unit had been disconnected.
His behaviour left one woman, who he repeatedly threatened, crying.
"If you don't get my electricity connected, I am going to come down and crush you c ... ts," he yelled down the phone.
Mr Funston said Scammell was calm on Wednesday compared with his usual "pretty aggressive" behaviour.
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Scannell was handed an 18-month jail sentence over the two incidents, one at the APCO service station shop in North Albury.
He pleaded guilty to two counts of attempted intimidation for his treatment of the public housing workers and to affray, destroy or damage property, intimidation and possess a prohibited drug - he had a pocket stash of cannabis - for the service station rampage.
Scannell was living in a Cahill Place unit when he phoned the Albury Department of Communities and Justice office on the afternoon of January 6.
He yelled abuse at the woman who answered, insisting she reconnect his power then "screamed" more abuse on calling again 15 minutes later.
She hung up and burst into tears.
Scannell arrived at the office 20 minutes later and abused a woman on the front desk and later, her team leader, then unleashed further rounds of abuse the following day.
His behaviour was the same at the APCO service station on May 19, when he began throwing stock around the store, enraged after he misjudged putting a Coke bottle on the counter, causing it to smash to the floor.
Scannell will be released on parole on March 18.
