Costco carrots

This post was born out of a need to do something with the biggest bag of carrots I have ever seen and could not resist, purchased at Costco.

On the other side of "what to do with 25 pounds of carrots that are about to go bad?" is "I need a recipe that will look great on my new platter" while taking the two liter bottle of tahini inhabiting the back of my refrigerator into consideration.

Yes, I also bought it at Costco. Frankly, I am sick of hummus (in every one of its incarnations) and I needed something different.

So I started Googling things.

There were so many recipes for roasted carrots with tahini sauce (and other accoutrements of varying degrees of fanciness), that it was hard to pick one.

I settled on a mashup of several recipes, starting with this one, from Katie's Bright Kitchen:

Katie's Bright Kitchen, Roasted Carrots with Tahini Drizzle

Katie's Bright Kitchen has adapted recipes for no sugar and no flour, making it gluten and dirty Keto-diet friendly.

It also looks as if diabetic exchanges have also been included

She's worked out all of the mathematics for this dish so you don't have to. Frankly, I just like my food to taste good, so I wasn't into thinking about it all that much. But, if that's the kind of chef that you are...this is likely the recipe for you.

Neither did I like the idea of not peeling my carrots, so that was strike two.

A stark absence of pistachios meant the end of this recipe, in my kitchen.

I also considered this recipe from the Forked Spoon, taking into account the 10,000 cans of chickpeas clogging my pantry (also Costco):

Forked Spoon, Carrots with Chickpeas

Then I found Simply Scratch's version of a similar recipe. It was written much more approachably (if my opinion counts for anything at all) and didn't appear to have been a poster ad for Whole Food's million dollar organic carrots.

Simply Scratch Turmeric Roasted Carrots

I really liked the idea of using turmeric. I had some in the fridge that I had bought on a whim and now had a reason to use it. Huzzah!

I set about peeling many, many carrots...

Sidebar: have you ever noticed the deeply meditative quality of vegetable peeling? I love peeling carrots. I glean tremendous enjoyment from the sound the peeler makes, sliding across the skin, whispering, "clean! Clean! Clean!" with every scrape of the blade.

(This may simply be a glaring indicator that I need to get out more?)

I love the way that carrots look, immediately after they've been peeled: bright, shiny and glistening. Almost as if peeling them has allowed their carrot-y awesomeness to finally be seen! 

I peeled the remainder of the bag; easily four pounds. Quartered them and put them in a freezer bag to mix with oil and spices (so much easier - and cleaner - than messing around with tongs and a bowl!).

We won't talk about the fact that I lost steam after prepping them all and left the bag of prepped veggies in the fridge to be cooked the next day (or two) later.

When I made them (finally), I didn't follow the recipe, really. I just jotted down the spices as indicated on the back of a scrap of paper and went to the kitchen to play.

A note on spices: I am not afraid of spices; flavor not heat. The two are not mutually exclusive. Generally people believe "spicy" to mean "hot". This is not the case. Spicy means that things have been spiced, or had spices added to them.

Cumin, for example, adds a distinctive flavor that adds no heat.

Also, I never really measure spices. My general rule of thumb is, "go til you can smell it".

In addition to the spices called for in the recipe, I added a few of my own.

To the carrots, I added (with the oil)

• fresh grated ginger (about 1 tsp)
• turmeric (a generous tsp)
• onion powder
• garlic powder
• black pepper
• paprika
• oregano
• chili flakes (pepper and chili flakes hit different spots on your tongue; different kinds of heat)
• mild chili powder (for the smoked flavor and color)
• cumin
• sea salt

I also added approximately 1 head of whole, peeled garlic cloves to the bag with the carrots. I like a lot of garlic. I also like what happens to garlic when roasted in the oven with oil. If you like less, use less.

Massage the carrots and oil and spices together in the bag until everything is lovely and coated. Your cooking oil will turn a lovely, marigold color and will become exceptionally fragrant.

The turmeric will dye the garlic cloves yellow. But it's such a lovely taste, you really shouldn't miss it.

I baked them at 425 for about 40 minutes. the edges of the carrots were just starting to caramelize and were just browning (remember: I had a lot of carrots).

I did not use the second baking sheet on top of the carrots (simply because I hadn't remember to do so). They turned out great.

Afterward, I transferred to my pretty new plate and topped with the sauce.

The sauce was easy to put together and was really, really tasty. I might have made it a little thin.

Next time, I plan to sprinkle the dish with some toasted sesame seeds, to really reinforce the sesame flavor. Thinking on it now, I might have used sesame oil to coat the carrots, rather than regular cooking oil.

Notes for my cooking journal, for next time.

Here's a picture, should you be interested after all that reading.

Love.