How to Cut Celery for a Relish Tray

Cut celery into manageable slices for the relish tray.

Celery has been a traditional element on relish trays since the late 1800s. At that time, celery was a rare, expensive vegetable, so people would serve it in elegant glass dishes on special occasions. Modern relish trays may have a series of small compartments for vegetables, pickles and olives, or they may be designed for different items to nestle together on a single flat surface. Cut the vegetables for your relish tray into bite-sized or two-bite-sized pieces. Does this Spark an idea?

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Paring knife
Chopping knife

Instructions

- 1
  
  Hold one end of a celery stalk between the thumb of your nondominant hand and the blade of a paring knife, with the knife against the stalk's ridges and your thumb against its curve. Press gently with the knife so it cuts through the flesh of the celery but does not sever the strings.
- 2
  
  Grasp the celery stalk with your nondominant hand. Remove the knife and set it aside. Pull the severed section slowly along the length of the stalk to remove the celery strings. Discard the strings.
- 3
  
  Slice the celery into shorter pieces with a chopping knife. If you have a relish tray with small compartments for each vegetable, cut the celery to fit inside a compartment. If your tray does not have compartments, cut the celery pieces to about 2 to 4 inches long.
- 4
  
  Cut each piece of celery in half down the middle, making two slender pieces. Halve each piece again if desired.
- 5
  
  Immerse the celery pieces in ice water for 10 minutes before arranging them on the tray. This gives them the characteristic crispness of relish-tray vegetables.