Rooting For The Underdog: Celery Root Chips

By Staff in Food on Jun 12, 2013 3:10PM

After a long, slushy winter, we’re ready to ditch our heavy stews and sleeping bag jackets and welcome farmers’ market season with open arms. At a recent trip to Green City Market, we spotted the first signs of spring in the spring onions, morels and rhubarb—and just past those, a table full of dirt-caked celery roots hanging around like lost puppies.

Compared to the colorful chards and fragrant mushrooms, these stodgy winter carbuncles aren’t as sexy (and somehow already look ancient as soon as they’re harvested). But the last of these winter cellar veggies can brighten up spring salads and snacks with a taste that’s a cross between a celery stalk and an apple. Inspired by apple chips, we peeled these bad boys and prepared to bring spring into our kitchen.

Oven-baked Celery Root (celeriac) Chips

Two celery roots
Olive oil
Kosher salt
Paprika

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Slice off the tops and bottoms of each celery root. The skin of celery root is too bumpy and thick for a potato peeler, but you can take it off using a smaller paring knife.

The root should look similar to a potato now. Slice it as thick or thin as you like, keeping in mind that thick chips need to bake a little longer. We used the side of a box grater to make thin chips, but a mandolin would work just as well.

Toss the slices in a bowl with a good swirl of olive oil, then arrange in one layer on a pan. Sprinkle with salt and paprika and pop in the oven until golden-brown, about fifteen minutes for thin chips and twenty-five minutes for thick chips. Let cool for half an hour.

Since this recipe is so versatile, it’s easy to swap out the paprika and go with kosher salt and vinegar or any number of other flavors instead. We mixed the first batch of paprika chips with a second batch of cinnamon ones, and the sweet and smoky combination was addicting and made a perfect side to a burger and beer out in the backyard. Happy snacking!

By Elite Truong