Full Giant Red Celery - Apium graveolens

The Red Giant celery is a highly aromatic herbaceous vegetable plant, reaching a height of 40 to 60 cm (16 to 24in), cultivated for its stalks and leaves. Its foliage is compact and vigorous, with a tender green colour. It has wide, fleshy ribs (stalks) in the shape of a dark red gutter, which are very decorative. The sowing period extends from February to the end of May for a harvest 6 to 7 months later.

It is a descendant of a plant called marsh ache, native to the Mediterranean. This vegetable plant was not considered a vegetable but rather a medicinal plant, until the Renaissance.

Celery leaves are used as a condiment in soups, stews, and to flavour certain sauces and stuffings. The raw, tender, finely sliced ribs can be part of the ingredients in composed salads. Celery has many virtues: anti-rheumatic, appetizing, digestive, remineralizing, and contains vitamins as well as copper, iron, and iodine.

Celery will require a significant supply of well-decomposed compost or manure (5 kg per m²), as well as potassium, in the form of, for example, wood ash.

Harvest: Celeries are harvested by cutting the whole plant at ground level as needed. This celery is sensitive to frost.

Storage: Before the frosts, from the end of October, the plants are pulled up with their roots and stored in trenches or kept in a cellar in sand.

Gardener's tip: Celery is particularly demanding in water and nutrients. Provide a good mulch to maintain moisture at the base of the plant and a good supply of organic matter.