The Virtual Dime Museum: An Ornament To The Table
Rated • 1 review • history, bizarre, food • blogspot.com
This history of celery!
From the page: "Celery was a luxury item for most of the 19th century, though it became cheaper, and thus more common on dining tables, from about 1885 on. By 1900, celery was more often served on a flat glass tray than in a vase.
Why was celery so expensive? And why did people like it so much? It was expensive for much of the 19th century because it was difficult to grow. Wild celery or smallage, native to Britain, had to cultivated by hand, coddled along really, in order to produce a tender, edible vegetable. Smallage in the wild is bitter and earthy-tasting; the French use it is stews and soups sometimes for a flavoring, but it cannot be eaten out of hand."
From the page: "Celery was a luxury item for most of the 19th century, though it became cheaper, and thus more common on dining tables, from about 1885 on. By 1900, celery was more often served on a flat glass tray than in a vase.
Why was celery so expensive? And why did people like it so much? It was expensive for much of the 19th century because it was difficult to grow. Wild celery or smallage, native to Britain, had to cultivated by hand, coddled along really, in order to produce a tender, edible vegetable. Smallage in the wild is bitter and earthy-tasting; the French use it is stews and soups sometimes for a flavoring, but it cannot be eaten out of hand."
