Celery Leaves Are Treasure, Not Trash

Published on Thursday, May 6, 2010, by Caitlin McGrath / Edit Post

Don't toss out the leafy tops of celery stalks. They have lots of flavor and can be used like an herb or eaten as a vegetable.

appycamper loves celery leaves in salads dressed with mayo. "They cut the mayo with a great sharp taste that I like much better than added vinegar," she says. "If I am fortunate enough to have a lot of celery leaves," says greygarious, "I use them as the green part of a salad." ipsedixit thinks they are lovely in banh mi.

Many hounds add celery leaves to soups and stews. "Like many other bitter greens, the celery leaves sweeten with cooking," says ChefJune. Pata_Negra adds them to steamed mussels and says they are much more aromatic than parsley. shaogo wilts the leaves in olive oil, adds tomato cubes, basil, and garlic, and serves them on fresh pasta.

For those who have an aversion to cilantro or are allergic, celery leaves are a good substitute, says CeeBee.

Discuss: Those fresh leafy celery tops

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POST A COMMENT |4 Comments

COMMENT

  • Love celery leaves! Pretty well any soup, stew, stuffing, side dish I make gets a good helping of celery leaves. My biggest problem is finding the darn leaves nowadays. It drives me absolutly bonkers to find the celery bunches in my local produce market & grocery store have been trimmed back so much, you can barely see a trace of celery leaf. I'm forever having to ask the clerks if they might...+READ

    Love celery leaves! Pretty well any soup, stew, stuffing, side dish I make gets a good helping of celery leaves. My biggest problem is finding the darn leaves nowadays. It drives me absolutly bonkers to find the celery bunches in my local produce market & grocery store have been trimmed back so much, you can barely see a trace of celery leaf. I'm forever having to ask the clerks if they might find me an untrimmed bunch from the backroom cooler. Such a shame too as the younger cooks in my area who are just starting to experiment with flavours, are missing out on a very tasty ingredient!-COLLAPSE

  • I love celery in all the ways afore mentioned but since I am a botany major, I know that celery is in the parsley family and so many times I have chewed celery or better yet the leaves to alleviate onion breath. The chlorophyll in parsley has many times been used for this purpose and was the original use for parsley on the plate as a garnish.

    To have as many "celery leaves" as I want I grow...+READ

    I love celery in all the ways afore mentioned but since I am a botany major, I know that celery is in the parsley family and so many times I have chewed celery or better yet the leaves to alleviate onion breath. The chlorophyll in parsley has many times been used for this purpose and was the original use for parsley on the plate as a garnish.

    To have as many "celery leaves" as I want I grow chervil which is a very large parsley and tastes exactly like celery. I dry it at the end of the season and have celery leaves all the time as needed.-COLLAPSE

  • I grew up with my mom collecting and drying celery leaves and then using them in stocks, soups, and stews - german, russian, polish foods. I never heard of anyone else using them until now - how cool!!

  • I dehydrate them and use them in stews and soup!