Cool carrots

The first spring carrots are starting to appear in the grocery stores, and why not take advantage of that and celebrate these tasty little spring beauties with this wonderful cool carrots salad?

I find that carrots are extremely versatile. With their elegantly sweet nature, they offer such and abundance of great taste pairings. And they are a great match for fish, meat and veggie dishes alike, all the while without losing their own distinct character.

Here, we’ve matched them up with some deliciously salty feta and black olives, and the fresh and fragrant mint simply just underscores that these are really cool carrots! I first came up with this recipe as a side for lamb, but really it will work well with most types of meat, fish or simply on it’s own.

Roasted carrots with feta, olives and mint (serves 4 as a side)

Ingredients

1.75 lbs (about 800 g) fresh carrots, washed well and tops removed

3-4 tbsp canola (rapeseed) oil

3.5 oz (100 g) black olives, pitted and sliced

3.5 oz (100 g) feta (block)

A handful of fresh mint leaves

Salt and pepper

(Olive oil to garnish)

Directions

1. Start by cutting the carrots lengthwise into 4-6 long stems depending on the thickness of each carrot.

2. Heat up the canola oil at high heat in a large and deep frying or sauté pan. Once the oil it hot, throw in all of the long carrot stems, and let them fry for about 10-15 minutes while turning down the heat to medium to high. Toss and turn the carrots every 30 seconds or so to make sure they do not brown too much. After 10 min. test one of the carrots to see if it is beginning to go soft. Ideally they should be soft on the outside but still retain firmness and bite inside. Lastly, season with a bit of salt and pepper before taking the pan off the heat.

3. Now, pour the roasted carrots onto a large serving platter. Chop the mint and crumble the feta and garnish with both along with the sliced black olives. If you like, finish of with a drizzle of olive oil.

Enjoy!

Liked our cool carrots? Here are a few more great ideas for awesome veggie side dishes:

Cauliflower feel good salad