Carrot and Celeriac Fritters or Latkes (Gluten Free)

Shredded carrots and celeriac combined into patties and fried to perfection. These could be a side dish, breakfast, or a fun addition to a latke party.

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One of the great things about root vegetables is that they keep such a relatively long time. Just like the Strategic Winter Squash Reserve in the basement (new and improved with white and sweet potato subdivisions!), root vegetables are an excellent resource for folks trying to eat locally grown foods in the winter months. I'm glad to support farmers who offer extended deliveries after the regular Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share season ends, knowing that for the most part I'll get long-storing vegetables that will see me into the new year.

I've got root vegetables filling up my crisper right now. After the local apples vanished (sad face there, there's nothing like a local apple in terms of flavor) I'd usually transition to crispers full of citrus fruit from the Band Fruit Fundraiser. But seasons change, and your kid who has been in band throughout high school moves on to college where you get to write big checks and not get a case of tangelos in return. So no citrus--right now I've got glorious carrots from the farm share packed into my crisper.

Carrot, Celeriac, and Potato Mash

A comfort food side dish of root vegetables simply simmered and mashed with butter and cream.

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One of my favorite subjects is food. No surprise there. When I meet someone new, especially someone whose people did not grow up a stove's throw from where we are chatting, I like to ask about favorite foods. 

If you've lived in places far different from where you grew up, I'll ask you about what foods you  remember from your time away. I'm deliberately avoiding use of the term 'exotic' here, because Arkansas and Louisiana are as exotic to me as British Columbia and Nepal.

As I chat with folks about food, I find I am more interested in those comfort foods that we crave, not Your Most Memorable Meal [unless it was memorable because of the warm feelings evoked of good company and good flavors--not dramatic showmanship].

This comforting side dish came about because of a conversation with the guy doing routine maintenance on my furnace. He's from England, living and working as an HVAC technician in the US, and when I brought up what foods he misses most, he said his mom's celeriac mash. He described it as a simple dish of celeriac, potatoes, and carrots. Mashed together with a bit of butter and cream.

I had a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share celeriac in the crisper and decided to make this for my family. It is simple, homey, humble, unassuming--an excellent addition to a plate of food. Taken by itself it could be considered boring to some, but I don't need my food to be always in my face. This was a nice companion to roasted chicken. It would be terrific in an array of Thanksgiving sides. Leftovers would make a nice crust for an egg casserole, like my Hatch Chile, Egg and Potato Casserole.

For more recipes using carrots, please see my Carrot Recipes Collection. For more recipes using Celeriac, please see my Celeriac Recipes Collection. For more recipes using potatoes, please see my Potato Recipes Collection. These collections are part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient, a resource for folks like me eating seasonally from the farm share, the farmer's market, and garden abundance. I'm sharing more side dishes on Pinterest and my FB page. For more information on How to Use This Blog, click here.

5 Tips to Feed Your Family From the Farm Share {Roasted Celeriac and Potatoes}

What do I do if my kid/spouse/guinea pig* won't eat _______ [insert name of vegetable]?

I hear from folks who join Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm shares that a prime concern is family members not liking particular vegetables. When we started eating from a farm share my kids were 6 and 8. The older one liked potatoes and occasionally tolerated baby carrots and apple slices [unless he absolutely loved them or abhorred them. It changed. A lot. Since his congenital brain malformation--Chiari, if you're wondering--comes along with a wicked gag reflex, he'd lose the contents of his stomach when forced to 'eat just one bite'. We learned to cut our losses. Probably TMI.] The younger one ate broccoli stems for fun and hadn't met a fruit she didn't like. My spouse? He's spent a year eating in Korea, a year eating in Iraq, and has been eating my cooking for nearly two decades. Awww . . . we've got an anniversary this year . . . but the point is he'll eat anything.

You'll notice only green things are left on his tray. He didn't like green back then.

When we started getting cabbage (a typical early season green) it went smoothly. Sautéed with a little salt and pepper, shown in my Simple Sautéed Chinese Cabbage, it was a hit with my girl and tolerable to my boy. Then the eggplant appeared. How on earth was I going to get that into them? In desperation I roasted everything roastable [is that a word?] from that box (NOT shown below, I wasn't blogging way back in 2006) and made spaghetti sauce. It worked! They ate it!

a typical late summer box

That recipe--the first one I ever posted on the internet [you can see it here at tastykitchen] opened my mind to the possibilities of produce. I could add some sort of pun thinking outside the farm share box, but I won't. In the ensuing years--I've just signed up for our 10th season--I picked up a couple of tips through friends, relatives, and trial and error. No tricks, though--I've always been aboveboard with my family about what we're eating.  They don't even ask if there are beets in the smoothie anymore, they just drink it. 

A few lessons learned (and then a recipe):