Celeriac recipes

Celeriac is a very common vegetable in Romania.

Ștefan Baciu, 13.10.2019, 14:00

The guest star today is celeriac,
which is used a lot in Romania in a variety of dishes, especially soups, in
combination with other root vegetables. Celeriac is rich in vitamins and is
recommended for people with a high cholesterol level. Raw, celeriac can be used
in a salad, grated, and in combination with carrots, also grated, and apples,
cubed. The salad also needs a bit of olive oil, vinegar or lemon juice, and
pepper and salt to taste. Cooked and cubed chicken meat can also be added to
this salad, which can be served as a starter.

Another easy recipe involving
celeriac is celeriac and cheese. First slice the celeriac thinly and put it in
a pot with water and leave it to boil. When the celeriac is done, pass it
through a sieve to get rid of the water, and then fry it in oil or butter in a
pan on the hob. When the celeriac becomes golden, turn off the heat. Put the
celeriac in an oven pot to form a layer, then add a layer of grated cheese.
Repeat until the pot is full, making sure you finish with a layer of cheese,
which you can brush with a beaten egg. Put the pan in the oven and leave it to
cook for 20 minutes at 180 degrees, until a crust forms on the surface.

Although it’s easy to make, celeriac
soup is actually not very common in Romanian cuisine, but we do find the recipe
in many cook books, both old and of a more recent date. What we need to make
this soup is about 1 kg of celeriac, half a kilo of potatoes, an onion and some
garlic cloves. Slice the celeriac and cube the potatoes and put them in a pot
to boil for 30 minutes, either in salted water or chicken stock. Separately,
slice an onion and some garlic and fry them gently in oil, then add to the pot.
When the vegetables are cooked, mash or blend them, then add some milk or
cream. To decorate the celeriac soup, you can use celeriac leaves which you
first fry gently in a little oil. You can also serve this soup with croutons.
You can use the same recipe to make celeriac mash to serve instead of mashed
potatoes as a side dish to a main course. Enjoy, or poftă bună as we say in Romanian!