70 By Holly & David Jones Food & Drink local produce • recipes • events
A fresh look at an old favourite D
on’t you just love a carrot? Sweet and crunchy and adding so much to so many dishes, sweet and savoury. Sadly, they do seem to be always
the bridesmaid and never the bride; always left to go a bit tired and wrinkly in the fridge while other more trendy veggies get picked up and used. You know - avocados, aubergines, kale – those cool kids who always get picked first for sports’ teams. While some vegetables go in and out of fashion, the carrot is a vegetable for all time, for the marathon not a sprint. I always feel a slight panic without a carrot to use, second only to not having an onion to hand. Having said carrots are the bridesmaids of the
vegetable world, they are now getting a bit trendy themselves and you can buy white, yellow and purple carrots in the heritage packs and can grow the different coloured ones from seed. The purple carrots were the original colour along with white and yellow when grown in Holland centuries ago; apparently the Dutch were the carrot farmers of the then world. When a few of the purple carrots mutated and became orange, the farmers developed these in tribute to William of Orange and the carrots stayed this colour until we started seeing the purple, white and yellow ones back in the shop in the last few years. Carrots have an inherent sweetness that
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For more of a starring role we use fully grown
“carrots are the
bridesmaids of the vegetable world”
comes out with slow cooking. If we’re making a tomato sauce, we will start by sweating an onion with a carrot and some garlic, all finely chopped in some good olive oil. Add a pinch of salt to bring out the juices and stop the vegetables colouring and wait for them to soften over a low heat. This gently cooked mixture will add a great depth of flavour and a sweetness to a tomato sauce without having to add any sugar which many recipes suggest as tinned tomatoes can be so lacking in sweetness. We’ll make tomato sauce in bulk and then freeze it to use with pasta, in soups, in casseroles and on top of pizzas. Much nicer than shop bought tomato sauce, easy to make and very satisfying all with the addition of a carrot. Baby carrots are delicious when just pulled and
washed clean from the garden but difficult to grow as the carrot root fly is partial to them too. I find a bunch of perfect small just pulled carrots irresistible especially when they’ve still got their frondy tops on; a still life picture on a market stall.
carrots in a cooked salad, slow cooked again with olive oil, orange zest and cumin seeds. Served at room temperature as part of a mezze/tapas style meal, it’s delicious on its own and a great accompaniment to grilled lamb with hummus and flatbreads. Even better if cooked in a woodfired oven to pick up a hint of smokiness. Carrot jam, carrot chutney, carrot pudding, carrot halva, carrot juice, carrot soup, carrot salads, carrot paté – yet more ways of using the sweetness of carrots without adding a lot of sugar. You do have to be careful with babies though – they adore the taste and sweetness of carrots in a purée so much so, however,
that our niece, when a baby turned orange, only toning down when her parents cut down on the carrots. Maybe Mr Trump is partial to them? #justwondering Our favourite carrot cake again relies on the carrot’s
own sweetness, a practical alternative to sugar during times of sugar rationing making carrot cake widely known during World War 2. Apparently carrots have been used in cakes and puddings for much longer than that though, with the first known carrot cake recipe from 950AD (according to the World Carrot Museum; I can feel a trip there coming on...). Ours combines carrots with ripe bananas which add to the natural sweetness. The acid test comes when we serve it to visiting WI groups and get nods of appreciation and them asking us for the recipe; always a nervous wait though! So this summer and further into the year, don’t leave
your carrots to go wrinkly in the vegetable drawer. Treat them well and they’ll repay you in bucket loads of flavour.
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