Celery Seed Uses: Slaw, Pickles, Bloody Marys, Rubs and Chowder

Celery seed tastes like celery turned way up: much stronger, slightly bitter, and without the stalk’s stringy, fibrous texture. Recipes tend to call for it by the half teaspoon. It’s happiest in cold, tangy dishes: slaw, pickles, potato and macaroni salads, and tomato drinks. It also holds up to heat, so it can go into a chowder at the start, and ground with salt it becomes the celery salt that finishes a Chicago-style hot dog. For what it is, see celery seeds.

At a glance

Those amounts come straight from the named recipes. McCormick’s advice on its whole seed: the pungent, somewhat bitter flavor goes a long way, so start with a pinch.¹⁰

Two notes before you cook

It holds up to heat. Katzer calls the seeds heat-resistant,¹¹ so you can add them at the start of a chowder or braise as well as stir them into cold dressings.

Whole or ground. The seeds are tiny and work fine whole, but grinding spreads the flavor through a dressing or rub. Katzer notes you can grind them and mix them with salt, which makes small doses easier to measure.¹¹ You can buy it pre-ground, too. Spices, Inc. describes ground seed as hay-like, grassy and slightly bitter.⁶

Coleslaw and creamy salads

Slaw is celery seed’s best-known job. Saveur’s German coleslaw whisks 1/2 teaspoon of celery seeds and 1 teaspoon of dry mustard into 1/3 cup of distilled vinegar, dissolves 1/3 cup of sugar in it, then streams in 1/2 cup of oil, for 8 cups of shredded cabbage and carrot.¹ The Spice House treats coleslaw as a standard celery seed dish and suggests caraway as a stand-in there.¹²

Spices, Inc. calls celery seed a must-have in deviled eggs and macaroni salad.¹³ The same pinch works in potato salad and in creamy dressings like ranch.

Pickles

The National Center for Home Food Preservation’s bread-and-butter pickles use 1 1/2 tablespoons of celery seed with 2 tablespoons of mustard seed and 1 tablespoon of ground turmeric, boiled in the vinegar and sugar syrup, for about 8 pints.² That’s a tested recipe and a good model. For canned pickles, stick to a tested recipe and don’t improvise the brine; that’s basic food safety. For quick refrigerator pickles of radishes, onions or cucumbers, a pinch of celery seed in the brine is a familiar move. See mustard seed uses for the other seed in that jar, and pickling spice.

Soups, chowders and cooked vegetables

Celery seed is a great addition to cooked vegetables. In soups it backs up fresh celery: John Fink’s New England clam chowder uses a teaspoon of celery seed alongside fresh celery.³ See clam chowder spices. It works in tomato soups and sauces too, and Spices, Inc. lists tomato juices and sauces among its uses.⁶

Want a sense of how concentrated the seed is? The Spice House swaps in 2 tablespoons of minced celery tops for every 1/2 teaspoon of celery seed.¹²

Bloody Marys and tomato drinks

The International Bartenders Association’s official Bloody Mary lists celery salt among its seasonings, to taste.⁵ Spices, Inc. names ground celery seed for Bloody Marys and tomato juices.⁶ Ground seed in place of celery salt lets you season the drink without adding salt, and you can still go for the usual celery salt rim. See celery seed vs. celery salt.

Celery salt and hot dogs

Celery salt is just ground celery seed and salt. McCormick’s label lists “Salt & Celery Seed.”¹⁴ A Couple Cooks makes its own at 1 1/2 parts ground seed to 1 part kosher salt, and notes that store-bought blends run between 1:1 and 2:1.⁴ Watch the salt: McCormick’s celery salt label shows 270 mg of sodium per 1/4-teaspoon serving,¹⁴ against an FDA Daily Value of less than 2,300 mg a day.¹⁵

Celery salt is the final shake on NPR’s Chicago-style hot dog with “the works.”¹⁶ See hot dog spices and celery salt.

Rubs and spice blends

Celery seed shows up in plenty of commercial blends. USDA’s purchasing specification for barbecue seasoning includes it with coriander, peppers, paprika, salt, onion, garlic, brown sugar and cumin.⁷ McCormick’s Cajun seasoning lists it with paprika, red pepper, thyme and black pepper,⁸ and Old Bay’s label lists celery salt first.⁹ In a homemade rub, grind it first so it spreads evenly. See BBQ spices, Cajun seasoning and Old Bay seasoning.

Two less familiar uses: Katzer reports celery seed as an occasional curry powder ingredient, and as a workable stand-in for radhuni, the Bengali seed used in some versions of panch phoron.¹¹ See panch phoran.

Baking

Home bakers put celery seed in rolls, rye breads and savory crackers, though none of the sources we checked gives a recipe.

Celery seed is not lovage

You’ll sometimes read that celery seed comes from “wild celery,” also called lovage. It doesn’t. Celery seed is the fruit of celery, Apium graveolens, and lovage is a different plant, the only member of the genus Levisticum, with a sweet, celery-like flavor of its own.¹⁷ See lovage.

Allergy note

Celery is one of the allergens EU food labels have to declare.¹⁸ It isn’t one of the nine major food allergens under US law.¹⁹ Celery seed and celery salt hide in a lot of blends, so check labels when you’re cooking for someone with a celery allergy.

Not yet measured

• How quickly ground celery seed loses flavor compared with whole.
• Sodium in celery salt brands other than McCormick.

Related

• Celery seeds and celery seed substitutes
• Celery seed vs. celery salt and celery seed vs. celery powder
• Celery salt, celery powder and celery leaves
• Mustard seed uses and mustard powder uses