Honey Garlic Butter Roasted Carrots | Glazed Carrots Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Should you boil carrots before roasting? ›

Overcook them, and they're dry and wrinkled. The secret is to soften the carrots slightly by boiling them briefly before roasting.

Cooking instructions

Heat the olive oil in a large sauté pan, then add the carrots and parsnips and toss to coat in the oil. Add the thyme, cinnamon, star anise and some seasoning. Cook over a medium heat for 15-20 minutes, turning the vegetables frequently, until golden brown and almost cooked through.

Flavor Enhancements

Use spearmint, marjoram, a small bay leaf, thyme, grated ginger root, chopped chives, dill or parsley.

As they cook, vegetables give off moisture, and when arranged too close together it results in a soggy outcome. Follow this tip: To achieve beautiful browning and crisp, roasted perfection, vegetables need some breathing room. Arrange vegetables in a single layer and don't overcrowd the pan.

Roasted carrots have the best texture, and the flavor is amazing. Roasting draws out the natural sweetness and you get a nice caramelized flavor. They're so much better than boiled carrots! Roasting is also easy; it's hard to overcook a roasted vegetable: if it gets too done, it's clearly burned.

Or, to bring out their fresh, woody flavor, add some anise. If you're roasting your carrots, toss them in olive oil first. This will help keep the moisture in them. To bring out the sweetness in your carrots, season them with orange or lemon juice or a little brown sugar and butter.

Also, fruits have more sugar content, something that can hinder the digestive process of vegetables. For the same reason, one shouldn't mix orange with carrot as when taken together, they may cause heartburn and excess bile reflux.

The carrot trick, which is as simple as adding pieces of raw, trimmed carrot to your frying oil, could prevent whatever you're frying and the oil itself from burning. When your frying oil doesn't burn away quickly, you won't have to keep adding more to the pan.

Method. Preheat your oven to 200°C/400°F/gas 6. Toss your carrots with a good lug of olive oil, a splash of vinegar, salt and pepper, the thyme sprigs and the garlic cloves. Place in a roasting tray or earthenware dish, cover tightly with tinfoil and cook for 30 to 40 minutes until just tender.

What brings out the sweetness in carrots? ›

“When the vegetable is cut, its cells rupture and release sugars and volatile hydrocarbons, the sources of the vegetables' sweetness and aroma,” he writes. "The more cells you rupture, the better the taste.”

Carrots are naturally sweet, cutting them doesn't affect the flavor. If you want them even sweeter, roasting is a good option. Toss them with some oil, and something sweet- maple syrup, orange juice or even a little honey. Then roast in a hot oven.

There are a few possibilities for why your carrots aren't as sweet as they should be. You are right to think about your soil--a crop of carrots can deplete a soil of nutrients. Be sure to rotate crops in your garden, rather than planting carrots in the same place year after year.

Although, carrots flavor profiles can change slightly depending on its size, color, and how it was grown. Typically though, if you want to enhance a carrot's flavor, they normally pair well with things such as ginger, garlic, honey, sugar, maple, and citrus fruits like lemon and orange.

Sometimes I've burned vegetables when roasting them until they were tender. Blanching veggies before roasting them allows them to caramelize a bit without burning.

Recipe tips

The vegetables and oil are being roasted from cold, so extra virgin olive oil's relatively low smoke point isn't an issue here. DO I NEED TO BOIL FIRST? Quartering the vegetables and removing the woody middles from the parsnips means boiling them first isn't necessary.

No, it's not necessary. However, many nutritionists say that cooking them (not boiling them to mush) makes the nutrients more accessible. I don't know, I just like them either way. However, when I was a child (I'm now 82), my grandmother had a way of cooking carrots that was anything BUT healthy!

Kenji says to use unpeeled quartered medium size carrots, simmered in salted water for five minutes, then roasted at 375 for 40 minutes.