Celery?

[janewilliams20]

That's twice now, the organic veg box has delivered a complete head of celery. I quite like a little sliced into a sandwich, in a stirfry, or chopped into a stew, but that's about it. Even celery soup recipes talk about a few stalks, not a complete head. Anyone got any ideas on what I can do with the stuff to use up large quantities?

Comments

[christhegoth.livejournal.com]

Lots of celery soup?

Dunno. Can you blitz it into a pate if you add say kidney beans? Dunno. Celery is that stick thing you eat of you're desperate. And only then with something to fix that blasted taste ;)

[mr-malk.livejournal.com]

She Who Must, and indeed my good friend Big Dave swear by eating it au naturelle, or with a dip, claiming (with some justification) that its natural shovel-like qualities make it an ideal dip vehicle.*

Myself, I use it for soup, or a couple of sticks (along with a chopped leek, carrot, onion, a few herbs and some peppercorns) for making stock.

Quite a few casseroles, hotpots and things use them, but as you say, not in vast quantities. good luck!

* Except for - as christhegoth rightly points out - the blasted taste.

[mr-malk.livejournal.com]

Oh, or if you know any fans of Chelsea football club, donate it to them. It's a tradition, so I'm told. There's even a song that goes with it.

[anselmo-b.livejournal.com]

Waldorf salad.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

Ooh, good point!
(adds apples to shopping list)

[anselmo-b.livejournal.com]

You can cram a cream cheese and blue cheese mixture into the stalks.
You can make spicy Bloody Marys and use stalks as edible stirrers.
Celery is an excellent seasoning and can be used in additionally in many sauces that you start by frying onions. Specially in tomato based sauces. You can either chop up a stalk in the same fashion as the onions, or you can just add it whole and remove it before serving.
You can use it to season chicken broth.
You can chop it into tuna salad and grill yourself a delicious tuna melt.
You can try my almond chicken recipe:
Stir fry a sliced clove of garlic and a large slice of ginger a few times over. Add a diced chicken breast and stir fry until the pinkness is gone. Then add some water (about half a cup you want to have a bit of liquid for sauce but no soup) 3 tbsp of soy sauce 3 tbsp of dry sherry. Stir a teaspoon of starch with the tiniest amount of water into a paste and pour it into the pot stirring to thicken. At the very last add celery stalks chopped into bite size chunks and peeled almonds (you can roast the almonds beforehand to enhance the flavour). Serve after two to three minutes or the celery will turn into a sorry mulch.

Enjoy and don't forget the walnuts for the salad!

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

Lots of ideas there - thanks! I used the "treat it as an onion" idea in a pork stew over the weekend, and that worked out quite well.

Only a head and a half to go.... but as others have said, the problem is "something to fix that blasted taste".