Simple roasted carrots get fancy when paired with roasted beet purée and topped with browned butter and crumbled feta cheese.
- Prep Time:
30 mins - Cook Time:
60 mins - Total Time:
1 hr 30 mins
I’m a sucker for beautiful produce. Multi-colored baby carrots are especially dangerous. They’ve been showing up pretty regularly at the farmers market lately and a bundle or two always seem to find their way into my grocery bags. I usually roast them for a simple and heathy side dish. However, when I saw this recipe that paired roasted carrots with beet purée and browned butter, I knew the extra steps would be well worth it.
I know I always say this but the quality of your produce will make all the difference. The carrots get roasted with only olive oil, salt, and pepper so the fresher the carrots the better. The beets are puréed with just enough shallots, sherry vinegar, and cilantro to add interest but still let the flavor of the beets be very present. The beet purée is so good I could imagine making extra to spread on some sourdough toast and top with avocados for an easy breakfast, lunch, or snack.
Given the beautiful magentas and purples of this dish, I’m going to propose this recipe as a basis for an elegant but very doable Valentine’s dinner. Who says Valentine’s has to be all about baby pink and red? Let’s get fancy. Serve these roasted carrots with beet purée along side some roasted salmon fillets and dinner is beautiful and healthy. How many special occasion dinners can say that?
Roasted Carrots with Beet Purée and Browned Butter
- Prep Time: 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 60 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
- Yield: 6 servings
- Category: Sides
- Method: Roasting
- Cuisine: American
Description
Simple roasted carrots get fancy when paired with roasted beet purée and topped with browned butter and crumbled feta cheese.
Ingredients
For the beet purée
- 1 pound medium-size red beets, trimmed
- 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
- 1 1/4 teaspoons kosher salt, divided
- 1/2 cup grapeseed oil or olive oil (I use olive oil)
- 2 tablespoons finely chopped shallot
- 2–6 tablespoons water (see Notes)
- 1 1/2 teaspoons fresh cilantro leaves, plus more for garnish
- 1 1/2 teaspoons red wine vinegar
- Pinch of black pepper
For the roasted carrots
- 2 pounds small multicolored carrots (see Notes)
- 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper, plus more to taste
For the browned butter
- 1/2 cup (4 ounces) cold unsalted butter, diced
- 1/2 cup hazelnuts or almond slivers, toasted and crushed (I use almonds)
- 3 tablespoons sherry vinegar
- 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
For serving
- 4 ounces goat cheese
Instructions
For the beet purée
- Prep oven. Heat oven to 400 degrees F.
- Prep beets. Peel and wash the beets and then cut them in half or quarters (depending on size) so they are uniform in size.
- Season. Place beets on a rimmed baking sheet. Toss beets with olive oil and 1/2 teaspoon salt.
- Cook beets. Roast beets in preheated oven until tender when pierced, about 20-30 minutes. Let cool about 15 minutes.
- Purée. In a blender, place grapeseed (or olive) oil, shallots, 3 tablespoons water, cilantro, vinegar, and remaining 3/4 teaspoon salt. Process until blended, about 5 seconds. Add beets, and process until desired smoothness, stopping to scrape down sides as needed. Add additional water as needed to get a semi-smooth purée. Stir in black pepper.
For the roasted carrots
- Prep oven. Increase oven temperature to 450 degrees F.
- Prep carrots. Remove tops from carrots, reserving 1/4 cup for garnish if desired. Discard remaining tops or reserve for another use. Cut any large carrots in half so they are all roughly the same size.
- Season. Spread the carrots in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet. Toss carrots with olive oil, salt, and pepper.
- Cook carrots. Roast carrots in preheated oven until carrots are browned in spots and tender, about 20 minutes, stirring once halfway through cooking.
For the browned butter
- Cook butter. While carrots roast, melt butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Continue cooking, stirring often, until butter browns and smells nutty, 5-10 minutes.
- Stir in. Remove butter from heat, and let cool 1 minute. Stir in hazelnuts (or almonds), sherry vinegar, lemon juice, and salt and pepper to taste. Be careful when doing this as the vinegar and lemon juice will cause the hot butter to foam up momentarily.
For serving
- Plate and serve. Spread a generous dollop of beet purée in the center of a large salad plate. Arrange some carrots on top and drizzle with about 1 tablespoon of browned butter. Crumble or shave some goat cheese over the carrots. Then garnish with cilantro leaves and reserved carrot tops. Repeat with remaining servings.
Notes
- The original recipe called for adding some water and covering the beets with foil when roasting them. I prefer to roast the beets uncovered for a deeper flavor. This does dry out the beets a bit more thus the need for the extra water. My blender also isn’t super powerful so I need the extra liquid to get the purée smooth. I blend it until it is the consistency of hummus.
- The original recipe called for 1 1/2 pounds of carrots with tops. The tops are mostly used as garnish so don’t worry if you can’t find carrots with tops. I also found that 1 1/2 pounds didn’t yield enough roasted carrots for my taste. The 2 pounds of carrots stated in the recipe is 2 pounds without tops.
- Recipe adapted from Food and Wine, January 2019.
Sarah Cummings says
Perfect for this valentine’s day. Very romantic and healthy serving. 🙂
Taming of the Spoon says
I totally agree. The colors are perfect for Valentine’s.