Hearty stuffed celery with a meaty filling, fried and simmered in meat sauce.
Prep Time10 minutesmins
Cook Time1 hourhr
Course: Main Course
Cuisine: Italian
Keyword: stuffed celery
Servings: 4
Author: Guido Pasquariello
Equipment
Pot or Pan
Kitchen towel
Weights (for draining)
Large Frying Pan
kitchen twine
Ingredients
4 celery stalks
10.5ozground veal
5.3ozground mortadella
1bunchparsley
1.75ozParmesan cheese
½garlic clove
5eggs
1.75ozflour
⅔cupextra virgin olive oil
Salt, black pepper, nutmeg to taste
Meat sauce for dressing
Instructions
Prepare Celery: Clean the celery, remove strings from the larger ribs, and cut into 3-inch pieces. Blanch in boiling salted water.
4 celery stalks
Drain and Cool: Cool the blanched celery under a kitchen towel with a weight on top to drain water.
Make Filling: Mix veal, mortadella, parsley, Parmesan, half garlic clove, two eggs, salt, pepper, and nutmeg for the filling.
10.5 oz ground veal, 5.3 oz ground mortadella, 1 bunch parsley, 1.75 oz Parmesan cheese, ½ garlic clove, 5 eggs, Salt, black pepper, nutmeg to taste
Stuff Celery: Once the celery is cool and dry, stuff some pieces with the meat mixture and cover with another piece. You can tie the two parts of the celery together with kitchen twine to keep them together during cooking.
Meat sauce for dressing
Coat and Fry: Dip the stuffed celery in flour, then in beaten eggs, and fry in hot olive oil.
1.75 oz flour, ⅔ cup extra virgin olive oil
Drain Excess Oil: Remove from oil and drain on paper towels.
Simmer in Sauce: In a wide pan, heat the meat sauce. Once boiling, add the fried celery.
Cook Until Done: Cover and cook on low heat until the celery turns a brick-red color. Leftover filling can be used for a meatloaf cooked in broth.
Notes
Traditional Prato cooks might use duck for the sauce or the famous papero (duck) sauce.