Behemoth
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CeleryTried my hand at celery this year, a self blanching variety, with suprising results. The big thick juicy stems for use in salads etc never appeared, possibly due to benign neglect and lack of watering. The resulting stems had lots of leaf and were thin, tough stringy stems. However when chopped up and used for culinary purposes for flavour they've been great, adding a more herby/celery flavour than shop bought. Also the Guinea pigs love the surplus.
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nettie
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Agree, I just grow mine for culinary use, I've never grown a decent stalk of salad celery! However the ones I do get are really intense in flavour. Once they've had the first frosts I just chop the stalks into lengths and bung them in the freezer, and pop a few bits in stews etc. One ran to seed so I left it and will collect the seeds soon.
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cab
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For fat stems you do better with a trenching variety.
For leaf, in culinary use, try chinese celery (kintsai). Easiest and best variety, imho.
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Behemoth
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I did, the slugs loved it! Wiped out all my oriental greens while my back was turned.
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cab
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Just goes to show how succulent they are
Slightly less sluggable is wild celery; you can get seeds from Nickys Nursery (or you could, haven't looked lately) and its even leafier and very tasty. Will go wild and self seed if you're lucky/unlucky (depends on perspective).
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baldybloke
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Had a fairly good crop of celeriac this year. Easier to grow and great with mashed potato.
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Jasper
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My celery this year was the best that I have ever grown.
I had better access to water and kept them very well watered.
I am sure that this made the difference.
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wellington womble
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The leaves on celeriac are good for flavouring stocks, soups and stews. Also, par-cel is very good at thriving on neglect and providing celery flavour, without any bother (we don't like celery sticks, but a bit in stock etc is nice)
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judith
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I have entirely given up on celery proper - it is too much of a slug magnet. But this year I sowed some leaf celery in the greenhouse and it has really done me proud. OK you don't get the crunchy stems, but then like WW I rarely eat celery raw anyway - mostly it goes to flavour stocks and stews.
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vegplot
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Would celery act as a sacrificial crop to attract slugs away from other plants or would they breed in ever greater numbers because of it?
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