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A Gentle Vegetable Dish of Old-Fashioned Grace

Heads of celery, braised in good chicken stock, are a reminder of the elegant days of hotel dining rooms and railway dining cars. A flashback to times before chefs were ever talked about, let alone ā€œcelebrities,ā€ and the head waiter rather than the kitchen ruled the roost. Braised celery is what I want to eat with roast turkey and the trimmings.

Recipe information

  • Yield

    enough for 4

Ingredients

celery – 2 heads
chicken stock – 3/4 cup (200ml)
butter – 4 tablespoons (50g)
garlic – a fat clove, peeled and flattened
Madeira – 3 tablespoons

Preparation

  1. Step 1

    Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Trim the bunches of celery, leaving the stalks attached at the root end and cutting each head down to about 8 inches (20cm) in length; keep the trimmings for stock. Cut each head in half lengthwise.

    Step 2

    Heat the stock. Melt the butter in a heatproof dish and gently fry the heads of celery over low heat without letting them color. Add the garlic and Madeira, then pour over the hot stock. Cover with a piece of buttered wax paper or a pan lid, then bake for forty-five to fifty minutes, until the celery is tender.

Tender
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