📌 Quick Summary: Celery Tips
- Stalk Celery: Loves water! Planting it in the greenhouse next to cucumbers ensures it gets the heavy watering it needs to produce thick, juicy stalks. Can also be overwintered in pots indoors.
- Root Celery: Excellent for winter storage. The massive roots stay fresh in the crisper drawer for months and add incredible aroma to winter soups.
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Potted Stalk Celery & Greenhouse Growing
I want to say a few words about celery… Previously, I gave up on growing stalk/stem celery because I figured it would never get thick and juicy in our climate, so I just bought it at the store.
But last year I bought seeds for a variety called Athena. It grew smaller leaves (looked almost like parsley), but the aroma was incredibly potent! In the fall, I dug up a clump and potted it in a 1.5-liter pot and brought it indoors to my windowsill.
It’s still alive right now! I pinch off a few leaves for soup all the time, and the aroma is fully preserved. I’ll probably plant it back out in the garden this spring. I assume it will bolt and go to seed (since it’s a biennial), but I want to see what happens.
Tanya, it will definitely bolt and flower in its second year. Make sure you sow some fresh seeds now for this season’s harvest!
A quick tip for stalk celery: if you plant the seedlings inside the greenhouse right next to your cucumbers, and water them heavily (cucumbers love water too), the celery will grow incredibly thick, juicy, and fat. My family doesn’t love eating fresh celery greens, but dried celery leaves are our #1 soup seasoning!
Root Celery for Winter Storage
Every year I make sure to plant 4 or 5 root celery (celeriac) plants. During the summer, I snip the leaves for soups and tomato canning. By fall, the roots grow to the size of a fist. I harvest them, and they keep perfectly fresh in the vegetable drawer of my fridge all winter long. Whenever I make soup, I just slice a piece off the root. We absolutely love the aroma; we hardly use parsley, but celery is a staple for us!
