Celery

A garden plant, Apium graveolens, consisting of a bunch of petioles, or leaf stalks, rather than a main stem. Cultivated or wild, this plant got its start in the Mediterranean. Although first cultivated for its medicinal properties, celery was long considered to have aphrodisiac properties. The Greeks called it selinon, and it's mentioned in Homer's Odyssey, which dates it from about 850 BC. Before the Christian era, the Greeks used celery leaves as a crown for their athletes, who were also given celery wine. The Romans used to flavor their foods with the seeds, and later on, during the Middle Ages, added it to a paregoric that was used to fight arthritis and help digestion.

Celery is really the cultivated variety of a common European weed called smallage, the English name for wild celery, which Italian gardeners improved beyond recognition during the 17th century. Up until very recently, celery was used medicinally only, as it was considered to be too bitter to eat even as late as the 16th century. It was first recorded as a food plant in France in 1623. The first stalks of celery were grown in America 16 years after the Declaration of Independence. The seedlings, sent for by Thomas Jefferson's gardeners, were meant to grace the herb garden at Monticello. However, the plants vanished in the Virginia climate. A Dutch immigrant who came to Kalamazoo, Michigan, with a sack of celery seeds is responsible for celery's triumph in the U.S. The first plant was harvested in 1874, and today it's the third largest agricultural industry in the country (after potatoes and tomatoes).

Celery contains the chemical furocoumarin psoralens, an essential oil known to cause contact dermatitis and skin sensitivity to light in some individuals. This chemical is also found in other foods, such as dill, caraway seeds and the peelings of lemons and limes. Photosensitivity has also been a problem for workers who handle celery daily with bare hands.

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