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Celeriac or Turnip-Rooted Celery
Pare one dozen of the celeriac, throw into cold water for thirty minutes. Then put in a saucepan, cover with boiling water, add a half teaspoonful of salt and boil thirty or thirty-five minutes. They should be tender when pierced with a fork. When done, drain, cut in slices, dish, cover with Cream Sauce and serve.
These roots also make a delightful salad dressed with Mayonnaise.
A straightforward boiled root with a cream sauce, but the quantity and the cutting order both need a second look.
- A dozen of what sizeModern celeriac at market runs 1–2 lb per root, so a dozen would feed a banquet. The book was most likely thinking of smaller kitchen-garden roots; for four people, one large celeriac (about 1½ lb) is enough.
- Cold water soakPeeled celeriac browns quickly, which is the likely reason for holding the roots in water. Acidulate it with a little lemon juice or vinegar and the flesh stays pale; plain water slows the discoloration but does not stop it.
- Peel deeplyCeleriac skin is knobbly and hides fibrous pockets and grit around the root end. Take off more than seems necessary with a knife rather than a peeler, and trim the base flat.
- Cut before boiling, not afterWhole roots take 30–35 minutes only if they are small. Quartered or cut into 1-inch pieces they are tender in 15–20 minutes and absorb salt more evenly. Slicing after boiling, as written, gives you hot slippery roots to handle.
- Salt levelA half teaspoon in a full saucepan is very lightly seasoned by current taste. Salt the water as you would for potatoes, about a teaspoon per quart.
- Don't overcookPast the fork-tender point celeriac turns watery and loses its nutty edge. Test early and drain the moment a fork slides in with slight resistance.
- Cream SauceCream Sauce in books of this kind is generally a plain white sauce: equal butter and flour cooked briefly, then milk or cream whisked in and simmered until it coats a spoon. Season with salt, white pepper and a little nutmeg.
- The salad noteFor the mayonnaise salad, cut the cooked root into matchsticks; dressing it while still warm helps it take up the mayonnaise.
Celeriac is a cultivated form of the same species as stalk celery, selected for a swollen hypocotyl rather than long ribs, and it has long been a staple of soups and winter salads in northern Europe — the older English name "turnip-rooted celery" is a literal description rather than a botanical claim. American vegetable books like this one spend a good deal of effort introducing roots that were familiar in Germany and France but still unusual on the American table, and the entry explains how to peel and boil it. The cream sauce finish is the standard treatment such books gave almost any boiled vegetable, and the mayonnaise variant points at the French rémoulade.