Ok I may have planted quite a few more celery plants than we needed... With more growing in the patch I needed to get busy with it.

I did make an awesome cream of celery soup though.  Another idea my mum uses which is lovely is boil it and mix it into your potato mash.

Cream of Celery Soup

• 20-30g of butte
• 5 cups of chopped celery
• 1 large leek sliced
• 2 rashers of bacon chopped
• 1.2L of hot water
• 4 tsp of veg stock
• 200ml of light cream
• chopped chives (from the garden of course!)

No need to add salt to this dish, there is enough in the butter, bacon and stock... the boiled down celery will also make it even saltier!

1. Melt the butter, fry the bacon and leek until the leeks are soft and clear looking.
2. Add the hot water and stock powder
3. Add the celery and bring to the boil
4. Cook until the celery is soft (I cooked them on a slow boil for about an hour)
5. Process with a blender (if you want super smooth soup, sieve the liquid through a strainer)
6. Add the cream and bring to the boil again, then simmer for 5mins
7. Serve with chopped chives

Yum! smooth, creamy and tasty
Serves: Makes a few bowls and some.

 Roasted Beetroot and Walnut Salad

• 3 large beetroots
• 100g walnut kernels
• 60ml (1/4 cup) red wine vinegar
• 60ml (1/4 cup) extra virgin olive oil
• 20g of Goat Cheese broken into pieces
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 large orange (juice half of it - keep the other half and chop into segments)
• A few handfulls of mixed salad leaves

1. Preheat oven to 200°C. Wrap each beetroot bulb in foil. Place on a baking tray. Bake for 1 hour or until tender when pierced with a skewer. Set aside to cool slightly. Wearing rubber gloves to avoid staining your hands, peel the beetroot. Cut into 3cm pieces.
2. Meanwhile, heat a large frying pan over medium heat. Add the walnuts and cook, stirring often, for 1 minute or until aromatic - set aside, place in serving bowl.
3. Whisk the vinegar, oil, orange juice and cumin in a jug. Season with salt and pepper. Use a zester to remove about 5-6 pieces of the rind from orange. (remove white pith from the rind. Cut the rind into very thin strips.)
4. Add salad leaves, cheese, beetroot and dressing to the walnuts. 
5. Add zest and orange segments.  Gently toss to combine. Cover and set aside to develop the flavours.

Serves: about 4-6.. well enough