Or you can order them from Chantal organic wholesalers. They are "not verified organic" and sell at approx. $7 a kilo. Having said that why not ring Putiputi Ra and ask if they order something from Chantals soon (bound to do) and ask if they can order a celeriac or two for you while they are at it?
Hope any of this will help.
What recipe are you making?
griffo4,
Jul 20, 6:04am
went to NW yesterday and they have never heard of it and also PNS thanks for ideas
griffo4,
Jul 20, 6:08am
Hi Uli thank you for that l will ring Putiputi Ra tomorrow and ask them and will look at the links you put up and if it is too much hassle l will go with celery in it place as l want it by Wednesday l am making a recipe from this months Taste mag it is a French recipe Baeckeoffe stew with brussel sprout salad it has beef, pork and lamb and a pigs trotter in it l thought it was different and interesting so will try it Thanks for your help
uli,
Jul 20, 8:30am
Let me know how you get on :)
griffo4,
Jul 20, 8:41pm
Will do l asked someone who had tried to grow them and not one seed come up so she was gutted as the seeds cost alot of money She did say people in Tauranga were growing and selling them at the markets and it was quite a process How did you get on growing yours?
uli,
Jul 21, 5:53am
I have no problem growing them - my bigger problem is getting enough composts built and fertility up to grow them nice and big. If I have enough help on that score they grow to about grapefruit or pommelo size. Otherwise they can be too small to be worth peeling. Best to bury something dead under them before you plant out. A couple of roadside possums will work well or any spare guts :)
Growing from seed is not easy if you have not done it often. Celery seeds (both stem and bulb ones) are tiny and take 4 to 6 weeks to germinate! So you need to have a moist (but not wet) and nicely drained seedbed for them which means you need to check on them at least 2 times a day. If the seedbed dries out only once during that time they will all die and you think they never germinated. Well they tried :)
You need to sow them in August so that by early October you can prick them out and pot them up then by mid December at the latest you need to plant them in the garden (earlier further South of course). They need the most fertile soil you have and all the sun they can get because they keep growing right until May/June up here. So you need a place where they can soak up the last sun before winter and store all the energy in the bulb you want to kill and eat.
uli,
Jul 21, 5:55am
In Northland you can leave them in the soil and harvest as you need them until September when they will start trying to flower which you do not really want except you want some fresh seed - then you need about 4 to 8 plants to flower together (make sure no celery flowers at the same time as they will cross pollinate and you could get all sorts of freaks but not nice bulbs!)
Last year I had so many that I fermented them for a trial and they have lasted us all summer - just now on the last jar. Won't get into details here about that enterprise.
In season I mainly just grate them raw into a salad. Make a sauce first of half good mayo and half Greek yoghurt, add some salt, pepper, maybe a bit of soy sauce and some vinegar - then using a coarse grater - grate 2 or 3 peeled apples (not the real sweet ones) into it and stir so they do not brown and then on a finer grater grate the peeled celeriac into the sauce (also stir so it doesn't brown) you can add some chopped walnuts for an even more indulgent salad.
Great with steaks, fried fish or any meal that has no sauce itself. I have seen that lately some posh chefs have renamed this old recipe into "celeriac remoulade" which is a bit misleading as it is really a salad and remoulade is a mayo with gherkins and other stuff in it but certainly not celeriac.
I also use it a lot in soups and stews and mixed with some Agria potatoes as a mash.
griffo4,
Jul 22, 5:27am
Thanks for that info Uli l will c&p it and will give them a try l will get seeds from King's seeds and see how they go and have plenty of possums to put under them
Dinner postponed due to health issues with family member so will let you know when l do make it
sampa,
Jul 22, 6:26am
Agree with uli re the mash with tatties - very tasty. Good to hear of other ways to use it too.
uli,
Jul 24, 6:13am
You can make them into oven fries too sampa!
kay141,
Jul 24, 7:16am
The last celariac I bought was starting to go pithy. That's it for me this year.
karlymouse,
Jul 24, 10:24am
I put some in a salad recipe I found and to be honest I would not bother again.
sampa,
Jul 24, 11:15am
Good to know thanks. My preferred 'fries' these days are made from Casava. something I picked up from a trip to Fiji.
uli,
Jul 24, 10:03pm
Going pithy has nothing to do with the time of year. It has to do with pushing it to grow fast in summer via too much fertilizer.
Mine is still in the garden and we get daytime temps of up to 18 degrees. None of them is pithy and won't be until the last one gets eaten (or fermented) in early November.
Try another grower or supplier if you want some more.
kay141,
Feb 17, 10:14am
They go pithy when they get too much frost. We have had some very hard frosts this year and days where the temperature has not risen much above freezing.
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