How To Store Celery Properly

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

Celery is a valuable crop readily grown by many summer residents. Soups with celery greens acquire a unique aroma, grated roots make the taste of various dishes more spicy, and celery itself is also very good. Therefore, the desire to preserve it throughout the winter is quite understandable, because it is so great to decorate food with fresh herbs in the winter cold

Root storage

During harvesting, leaves are cut from root crops intended for subsequent storage, leaving only small petioles. If you plan to buy celery, it is important to ensure that the skin of the acquired root crops is smooth, and the surface is as even as possible, without knots. This makes them easier to clean. To detect the presence of voids, it is quite enough to knock on the root crops - the existing voids will give out a sonorous sound. And by slightly pressing on the tops of the root crops, you can check if they have begun to rot.

If celery will be eaten in the near future, it is quite enough to wrap it tightly with cling film and send it to the refrigerator - for a week, the root vegetables will preserve all their most valuable qualities, as well as their unique spicy taste and pleasant tart aroma.

And in order to preserve nutritious roots for much longer, they are stuck vertically into a box of sand so that the petioles are at the top, after which they are removed underground or transferred to the cellar. Some summer residents put root crops in bunches (the petioles should be outside), alternating each layer with soil or sand. And in order to protect celery from mushroom ailments, a little chalk is added.

You can store prepared root vegetables in clay. To do this, a creamy mixture is prepared from the clay, in which each root crop is dipped, after which they are all thoroughly dried and stacked in stacks.

Another way of storing celery roots has also proven itself well: the roots are placed either in small wooden boxes equipped with solid walls, or in strong plastic bags, covered with sand about 2 cm from above and sent to a room where the air temperature does not exceed one degree, and the air humidity indicator is close to 90%.

It is very convenient to store the collected celery roots in a dried form - having freed them from the skin, they are cut into strips and dried in the sun. The dried straws are then placed in closed glass containers.

There is another excellent storage option - pre-peeled celery grated on a grater is laid out in bags and sent to the freezer. This method of preparation is good because celery can be removed from the freezer at any time of the year and can be safely used for cooking various foods directly in frozen form.

Storage of leaf and stalk celery

For storage, you should select celery, the stalks of which are painted in juicy green tones. In addition, they should be brittle, since the elasticity of the stems is an indicator that the celery has lost its original freshness, and the content of nutrients in it has been significantly reduced. It is also important to ensure that the formation of seed arrows does not begin at the stalks, otherwise the stalks will taste bitter.

Since celery greens fade in a fairly short time, immediately after it is purchased or after it is cut from the beds, it is washed, allowed to dry, wrapped in aluminum foil and placed in the refrigerator. Leaves with petioles retain their freshness in this case for about ten days. If, instead of foil, they are wrapped in polyethylene film, then after three days they will wither.

To prepare a celery seasoning, its greens are laid out on an impressive sheet of clean paper, and covered with another one of the same sheet on top. The collected greens are dried for about a month, and then laid out in paper bags and used as a seasoning at any time of the year.

If you want celery to remain fragrant and juicy green, it is frozen in ice cube trays. To do this, select the freshest greens, which do not have yellowed twigs, grind it, place it in molds, pour it on top with water and put it in the freezer.

The greens to be added to the main course are packed in airtight durable plastic containers and sent to the freezer.

And, as an option, you can salt the greens, spending 100 g of salt for every pound of celery. The rolled jars of salted celery are allowed to brew for a couple of days. Salt will prevent spoilage and decay of celery, therefore, salted greens can be easily used throughout the year.