Celery: white or green?

[Morning Glory]

I'm pretty sure that until fairly recently, most celery sold in the UK was mainly white (with green ends). Now I find that whenever I order it, its green. I note that most photos posted by members in other countries also show green celery.

Not sure why....

 

[TastyReuben]

I’ve never known celery to be classified as white or green. It’s all green to me.

Well, that is to say, I buy a bunch of it, and the outer ribs are green, but the further you move inside, the whiter they get.

 

[caseydog]

I’ve never known celery to be classified as white or green. It’s all green to me.

Well, that is to say, I buy a bunch of it, and the outer ribs are green, but the further you move inside, the whiter they get.

I imagine is has to do with photosynthesis. The outer stalks get all the sunlight. It could be that celery in the UK had the outer stalks removed in the past, before food waste became an issue, but now they are left in place.

CD

 

[TastyReuben]

I will say that for eating raw, I do much prefer the inner (white) ribs. Those rarely get cooked. Once I get to those… munch, munch, munch.

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

Celery is often deprived of sun light by growing it in a collar to force it to be straight and tall and crucially paler. It makes the taste less strong, less bitter and sweeter, like the one most celery stalks of a head of celery. It's called blanching, but not the culinary version. The gardening version. Similar to forcing rhubarb.

Information about How to Blanch Celery

And also How to Blanch Celery in the Garden | Gardener’s Path

There are many varieties of celery, including a "self blanching" heirloom variety that naturally grows golden. It starts off green and as it matures it goes golden, and the flavour isn't as strong, or as bitter and the plant naturally a little sweeter than typical celery. Generally called golden celery. I grew some this year.

Clearly this isn't the most cost effective method for farmers growing on large scale, so it is typically being skipped more and more as less bitter varieties of celery are breed.

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

I'm pretty sure that until fairly recently, most celery sold in the UK was mainly white (with green ends). Now I find that whenever I order it, its green. I note that most photos posted by members in other countries also show green celery.

Not sure why....

The UK always had paler celery than in other countries I've visited/ lived in. It was something we noticed immediately on moving to Australia, how much greener the celery was (and larger and so many more leaves)...

One thing I've noticed over here though is that people don't force rhubarb in early spring. Those first few stems of forced rhubarb early in spring were amazingly dry and delicious.

With newer varieties of celery being bred all the time, there is no longer the need to blanch (gardening term, not culinary) celery anymore to reduce the bitterness that comes/came with very green celery. You can still buy heirloom varieties of golden celery that blanch naturally for you and they are much less bitter than the green stuff.

I guess it's similar to no longer needing to salt aubergines to remove the bitterness because it's been bred out of them. And similarly with onions not making your eyes water in the UK (they still do in Australia! ).

 

[karadekoolaid]

SatNav is spot on , as usual. I do remember that, when my dad used to grow celery in the garden, he'd keep covering it with earth until it was fully grown. White from head to toe. Here in Venezuela, celery is always green.

 

[TastyReuben]

Interesting about the different varieties. Celery is one thing we never grew growing up, and in the grocery store, it’s just green celery, which comes in the whole stalk with the tops cut off, an organic version of that, and then packages of celery hearts, which I suppose would be more like what everyone is referring to as white celery, but it’s still not that white.

All items from Kroger

I’ll point out, I’ve never seen that many leaves on the celery in the store!

 

[Morning Glory]

SatNav is spot on , as usual. I do remember that, when my dad used to grow celery in the garden, he'd keep covering it with earth until it was fully grown. White from head to toe. Here in Venezuela, celery is always green.

...after consulting Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book (1978) , I found this quote about types of celery:

"The pale greenish heads of celery on sale most of the year, usually in long plastic bags and the winter celery encrusted with black soil"

Further research revealed this:

Fenland celery is a unique white winter celery that is available to buy from October through to the end of December.

A British heritage ingredient, whose delicate sweet, nutty taste and clean, crisp texture is owed to the traditional growing methods and rich, Fenland soil in which it is grown. Fenland celery is part of an exclusive club of quality British foods that have earned Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) status from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.
This special crop is only available for 8 short weeks... the advice is to get it while you can!

Fenland Celery

So, I'm assuming this is the winter celery to which Grigson refers (hence the 'black soil') and very possibly the kind I remember eating. Yes, it is 'blanched', but in this case by banking up the rich dark Fenland soil - similar to the technique your Dad used karadekoolaid.

BTW this website (and Jane Grigson's book) has quite a lot of good looking recipes for celery.