Just how many things can you do with celery? I grew several bunches of ‘Giant Red’ this year, more for the novelty of seeing the colour than any great taste for it.

Colourful ‘Giant Red’ celery

Happily it turned out both colourful and delicious, but now faced with more than I know what to do with, I jumped at a suggestion on-line of making celery salt.  Following a recipe, although it’s incredibly simple, I went outside and ripped a handful of leaves from the plants.

Celery leaves before drying

I’m so relieved that celery seems happy to stand in this cooler weather without perishing. Mine still look very healthy as I pick off the odd stalk to eat raw or add to a stir fry.

Celery leaves, oven dried

Fifteen minutes in the oven at 150C/300F dried the leaves nicely, so they were crisp but still green.  That made them very easy to smash up in a pestle and mortar.

Crushing the leaves with a pestle and mortar

Then it was a simple matter of adding about 1.5 times the amount of flaky sea salt. Luckily I had a box of Maldon in the cupboard, which is perfect.

Celery salt

The smallest Kilner jars (70ml size) are just right, although I was guessing at the quantities today and didn’t make an awful lot. I’ll do more next weekend and fill a couple of these cute jars.  The salt should be nice sprinkled onto soups in particular.

Celery salt

Kilner had already come to the rescue a few days ago, when I bottled some tarragon vinegar. A bunch of french tarragon leaves had been steeping in a jar of white wine vinegar for a month, long enough to mix the flavours.

Tarragon vinegar

A muslin cloth and funnel were all that was needed to fill this flip-top bottle. It’ll add zing to stews or salads, although I must admit the combination of salt and vinegar on this page is making me crave fish and chips!