What Do I Do with All This Celery??!!!

On the soup note, when I have extra celery I chop it up fine, store it in freezer bags and freeze it for soup later on.

Chop it up and freeze it. It works awesome in soups, stuffing, etc. I do that all the time because we never use a whole thing of celery. Then when I make something that calls for celery (and it is a cooked recipe), I get out the desired amount and throw it in. It works awesome!

I made a yummy stirfry last night and used half a bunch of celery. It had carrots, celery, onion, snow peas, mushrooms, and carne asada meat in terriaki sauce.
We also like peanutbutter on it. and just a crunchy snack by itself.
Ask a neighbor if theyd like it.
Donate it to the homeless shelter.
Let the kids do an experiment with a couple stalks.. wash them off, and stick the big cut end in a glass of water colored with food coloring and over the next few days watch the color creep up to the top. Red and Blue work best.

Celery is great for making chicken/vegetable stock, and you can cut it up fine into a mire poix (the celery/carrot/onion mixture that's the base for many soups, including chicken soup). But given that it's supposed to top 100 where you are for the foreseeable future, I'm guessing you're not in the mood to make soup.

Really finely chopped celery is fantastic in salads like chicken salad and tuna salad. You don't taste it too much but it makes a great crunch.

I'd say just eat it plain (I dip mine in vinegar), or put cream cheese on it, but if you guys don't like celery that won't work. In that case, the freezing or donating suggestions are probably best. Or throw a party and put it out as an appetizer :)

Gotta love co-ops. The veggies are always great but you get the oddest amounts of things (we used to get about 8 onions a week - no joke - but only enough broccoli for one person). We switched to Suburban Organics and they're great, but I think it's only east coast. Maybe you have something similar in Texas?

Make a BIG batch of red lentil soup, with LOTS of celery (and carrots.) I blend my lentil soup, so the veggies all get pureed and my kids can't even tell what I put in it. Let me know if you'd like my recipe, as it is my own.

How about American Chop Suey? That calls for celery and it is delicious!

Holy Trinity

Celery, Onion, Green Pepper

It's the "base" for nearly all cajun cooking. I'd be making gumbo-laya (I'm a heathen, I make a mix of gumbo and jambalaya rather than either or) out on my BBQ in nothing flat. ((Or cook indoors if I had air conditioning)).

For the rest: Chop it, plunge into boiling water for about 60 seconds - 3 minutes (depending on how big I chopped it) then plunge into icewater/cold running water (aka blanche it), then dry them off, ziplock up, freeze it, and save for stew season.

My mom used to blend it in the blender (take off any stringy pieces first) and put it as a thickener in beef veggie soup. I never knew it was in there. She'd blend it with a little water, tomato juice, and/or broth and dump it in the soup.

Go give a bunch to your neighbor and say "Happy Saturday!"

Do you like it in chicken salad? Dice it up teeny tiny with some pickles, diced cooked chicken, hard boiled egg, mayo, salt and pepper. Eat on bread or with crackers.

If you can't think of anything else, rescue organizations love celery for their guinea pigs, ours LOVE it!

When I was younger, I HATED celery. I could tell if ANY food I was eating had the tiniest bit of celery, celery salt or celery seed in it. As an adult, I now LOVE it. But I can relate to your family because of my childhood hate relationship with celery. There really are not a lot of ways to mask the taste of celery. I find celery tastes less like celery the longer it's cooked though. Yes, you lose a lot of nutritional value that way, but if that's the only way you can eat it, well, there you go.

I use celery both inside the cavity and in the bottom of the pan when I roast a chicken. I also use carrots, onions, thyme, etc,, but all the root veggies and herbs give the bird a great flavor and the drippings make a crazy good gravy. And depending on the size of the bird, the celery that was in the roasting pan is often nice and soft so it's lost a lot of celery flavor, and taken on some of the chicken and herb flavors in the cooking process. The veggies in the cavity are usually still crunchy so you'd probably want to throw those away after cooking, but adding the veggies in the cavity really does make a difference in the flavor of the bird.

And along the same lines, sometimes people like a veggie roasted that they would never like raw. Just cut it into smaller pieces so it will cook faster than the rest of the veggies you're roasting, thereby losing some more of it's celery taste. Make sure you season well too with flavored oils, herbs, spices and/or broth.

I too recommend cutting up some of the celery and freezing it for when you want to make homemade stock, or for use in stews or soups. With stocks, you would strain out the veggies anyway so that would be one good use. If you want to use it in a soup or stew, you can always cook it with the liquid and then puree it if texture is an issue.

I know how it is when you don't want to waste food, especially being on a tight budget. I'm right there with ya.

Blessings,
N.

Celery sticks with hummus or ranch dressing. Thin slices in a green salad. Diced up small in potato salad. And my favorite, cooked in crawfish etouffee.

if you haven't seen the nutrition documentary on netflix or at the .com please take the time to see it! Don't let the title put you off it is so inspiring and makes you enjoy feeding your children well. It is called Fat Sick & nearly Dead and the website about the australian man joe the story is about is called join the reboot.com any way in nearly every one of his juicer recipes he needs celery it makes even the fruit one taste fresh and light

We used to make a meal when I was little - Celerie Au Jambon - (celery with ham).

We quartered the celery bunch lengthwise, blanched the celery in chicken stock, drained, then wrapped it in good quality sliced ham. Placed in a baking dish covered with a cheese sauce.

I can't find the original recipe but I remember it as being a really good dish. The celery took on a much more mellow flavour. I know I made this in Home Ec in high school and everyone liked it.

I did a search for celerie au jambon - got a lot of results - most in French - but Google will translate the page.

:) I just found this site also - http://suzette.typepad.com/the_joy_of_soup/2003/11/celery...

make stews? Slice real thin for salads?

Oddly enough my dog LOVES hard veggies like that as chew toys, so if you have a dog you could do that - although it not the best solution. Or you could donate a couple bunches to your local food kitchen at least that way you don't feel bad about putting it in the trash.

Do you have a local food pantry? They may be able to use it.... in Georgetown, the Caring Place even said they would take extra produce from your garden..... they like to be able to give the fresh veggies when it is available, as an addition to the food bags they give out.

Or... a soup kitchen, or something like that?

At least it is getting used.

mine likes it with peanut butter and raisins (or craisins) when I tell him it's called ants on a log. celery keeps for a while if you wrap it in tin foil.

celery and peanut butter or celery with cream cheese are a favorite around here. If you wrap it up tight in tin foil it will last a lot longer. If you arent going to eat it raw I'd chop it up and freeze it for soups and such.

oooh man - if we lived closer - I would take it and trade it for something else!!!

Peanut butter and raisins (that's for my boys - i don't like raisins) - ants on a log - is what we call them....

Cheese - yahoo!!!

ranch dressing!!!

chopped up in a waldorf salad....or any salad..

cut up and put in the slow cooker with a roast - hhhhmmmmmmm.......

flash steam it - then freeze it for winter to add to chicken soup, potato soup...any soup!!

chop it up and freeze it to use for seasoning

Haven't tried this, but it was raved about on another list I follow - Celery Salt:

http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/homemade-celery-salt...

I am not a huge fan of celery either. If you want to eat it raw you can try using a veg/fruit peeler to "peel" the celery. This will remove a lot of those "stringy" bits that a lot of folks, including myself, do not enjoy about celery. The most useful thing to do with celery is use it in cooking. Use it in stocks, soups, spaghetti sauce, etc. It gives great flavor when used in mirepoix (onion, celery, carrot) and then strained out so you don't actually have to EAT the celery. Hopefully you can find something yummy to do with it!

Its really good with Laughing Cow cheese or cream cheese or blue cheese dressing...you could make wings!
Make chicken noodle soup using sauteed celery and carrots
I put it in my vegetarian chili (look up south beach diet veg chili if you want the recipe)

Here's a recipe for a side dish that you might like. It uses only the heart of the celery, which is milder than the outer stalks.
Ceci alla Siciliana (Sicilian Chick Peas) (Michael Chiarello, Napastyle)
2- 14 oz cans chick peas drained and rinsed
3/4 c. very thinly sliced heart of celery, including some of the leaves
1/2 red onion, minced (I have used other types of onion)
3 TBSP minced Italian parsley
2 cloves garlic, finely minced or put through a press
5 TBSP extra virgin olive oil
3 TBSP white wine vinegar or champagne vinegar
sea or kosher salt to taste

Combine all. Serve immediately or let stand for an hour or two and re-season before serving.

Next time, can you exchange it with another member? I've done that in my coop. Our coop has an "extras" bin where you can take something or leave something.

Cut it up and freeze it - use it in soups and sauces. I saute with butter, onion, chopped carrots and put in homemade spaghetti sauce (add browned meat, tomatoes, sauce, and paste).

You can put it into all kinds of soups - veggie soups with a tomato base, and also any soup you puree - just saute it with the onions.

I am jealous of the coop - is it in Garland?