Brined Grilled Carrots with Cilantro-Yogurt Sauce
By America's Test KitchenPublished on April 24, 2017
Time
55 minutes
Yield
Serves 4
Ingredients
Before You Begin
This is a perfect side dish for times when you’re firing up the grill for other items on your dinner menu. Carrots are great when served warm or even at room temperature, so if you’re going to be grilling other items as well, we recommend cooking these carrots first. Young carrots (not to be confused with baby-cut carrots) are immature carrots, harvested early in their growing cycle. Look for carrots that are 3 to 5 inches long and ½ to 1 inch in diameter, with the leafy green tops still attached. We like the flavor, texture, and appearance of these carrots unpeeled. Peeled carrots will absorb salt more rapidly, so we don’t recommend peeling them for this recipe. If you can’t find young carrots, bagged mature carrots can be substituted. Halve the carrots lengthwise to approximate the diameter of young carrots. Additional cilantro can be substituted for the carrot tops.
Instructions
- Rinse and scrub carrots to remove any dirt. Whisk water and salt in large bowl until salt is dissolved. Submerge carrots in brine and let sit at room temperature for at least 45 minutes or up to 1 hour. (Carrots brined with this salt concentration will start to taste too salty if brined longer than 1 hour. Brined carrots can be removed from brine, patted dry, and refrigerated for up to 3 hours before cooking.) Transfer carrots to paper towel–lined plate and pat dry. Discard brine.
- Meanwhile, process 1 cup cilantro, 1 cup carrot tops, yogurt, 3 tablespoons peanuts, jalapeño, ice, ginger, garlic, and coriander in blender on high speed until smooth and creamy, about 2 minutes, scraping down sides of blender jar halfway through processing. Taste for spiciness; if desired, add more spice by blending in reserved jalapeño seeds. Season with salt to taste. Transfer yogurt sauce to small bowl, cover, and refrigerate until ready to use.
- For a Charcoal Grill: Open bottom vent completely. Light large chimney starter filled with charcoal briquettes (6 quarts [4½ pounds]). When top coals are partially covered with ash, pour evenly over half of grill. Set cooking grate in place, cover, and open lid vent completely. Heat grill until hot, about 5 minutes. For a Gas Grill: Turn all burners to high, cover, and heat grill until hot, about 15 minutes. Leave all burners on high.
- Clean and oil cooking grate. Place carrots on grill (directly over coals if using charcoal) and cook, turning occasionally, until carrots are well charred on all sides and just beginning to soften on exteriors, 3 to 5 minutes for very small carrots and 5 to 7 minutes for larger ones. (For this dish, you don’t want to fully cook the carrots; they should still be crunchy at the centers.) Transfer to serving plate.
- Drizzle yogurt sauce over carrots, then sprinkle with ¼ cup cilantro, ¼ cup carrot tops, and 1 tablespoon peanuts. Serve.
Time
55 minutesYield
Serves 4Ingredients
Ingredients
Ingredients
Why This Recipe Works
by Sasha Marx
By now we’ve all experienced firsthand how brining can transform lean, easy-to-overcook cuts of meat and poultry into juicy, well-seasoned showstoppers. Great—now that we’ve got that covered, it’s time to brine your vegetables. Seriously. We love grilling whole young carrots and serving them at a barbecue or a fancy dinner, but let’s face it: They are really tricky to season evenly. Dusting raw carrots with salt is like throwing a tennis ball at a garage door—it just bounces right off. You can coat them in fat to give the salt something to stick to, but that seasoning will only be skin deep.
Enter brining. Just 45 minutes in a salty bath (we found that an 8 percent salt solution worked best) changes the vegetable-grilling game. Unlike with meat, where we brine to add water, increase tenderness, and season, our goal here is primarily seasoning (though the carrots do soften slightly in the brine so they’ll cook a bit faster). The salt diffuses into the carrots, so instead of a layer of intense salt surrounding a bland interior, we get carrots that taste more like themselves. Not salty. Carrot-y. After they come out of the brine, we grill them quickly over a hot fire to develop char and smoky flavor without sacrificing crunch. Drizzled with a bright, slightly spicy cilantro-yogurt sauce and sprinkled with peanuts and fresh herbs, these carrots might just become your new favorite side dish to bust out during grilling season.
Photography by Steve Klise
Before You Begin
This is a perfect side dish for times when you’re firing up the grill for other items on your dinner menu. Carrots are great when served warm or even at room temperature, so if you’re going to be grilling other items as well, we recommend cooking these carrots first. Young carrots (not to be confused with baby-cut carrots) are immature carrots, harvested early in their growing cycle. Look for carrots that are 3 to 5 inches long and ½ to 1 inch in diameter, with the leafy green tops still attached. We like the flavor, texture, and appearance of these carrots unpeeled. Peeled carrots will absorb salt more rapidly, so we don’t recommend peeling them for this recipe. If you can’t find young carrots, bagged mature carrots can be substituted. Halve the carrots lengthwise to approximate the diameter of young carrots. Additional cilantro can be substituted for the carrot tops.
Instructions
- Rinse and scrub carrots to remove any dirt. Whisk water and salt in large bowl until salt is dissolved. Submerge carrots in brine and let sit at room temperature for at least 45 minutes or up to 1 hour. (Carrots brined with this salt concentration will start to taste too salty if brined longer than 1 hour. Brined carrots can be removed from brine, patted dry, and refrigerated for up to 3 hours before cooking.) Transfer carrots to paper towel–lined plate and pat dry. Discard brine.
- Meanwhile, process 1 cup cilantro, 1 cup carrot tops, yogurt, 3 tablespoons peanuts, jalapeño, ice, ginger, garlic, and coriander in blender on high speed until smooth and creamy, about 2 minutes, scraping down sides of blender jar halfway through processing. Taste for spiciness; if desired, add more spice by blending in reserved jalapeño seeds. Season with salt to taste. Transfer yogurt sauce to small bowl, cover, and refrigerate until ready to use.
- For a Charcoal Grill: Open bottom vent completely. Light large chimney starter filled with charcoal briquettes (6 quarts [4½ pounds]). When top coals are partially covered with ash, pour evenly over half of grill. Set cooking grate in place, cover, and open lid vent completely. Heat grill until hot, about 5 minutes. For a Gas Grill: Turn all burners to high, cover, and heat grill until hot, about 15 minutes. Leave all burners on high.
- Clean and oil cooking grate. Place carrots on grill (directly over coals if using charcoal) and cook, turning occasionally, until carrots are well charred on all sides and just beginning to soften on exteriors, 3 to 5 minutes for very small carrots and 5 to 7 minutes for larger ones. (For this dish, you don’t want to fully cook the carrots; they should still be crunchy at the centers.) Transfer to serving plate.
- Drizzle yogurt sauce over carrots, then sprinkle with ¼ cup cilantro, ¼ cup carrot tops, and 1 tablespoon peanuts. Serve.
Gift This Recipe
Enjoyed this dish? Let others know by sharing it as a gift recipe.
Appears In
Keep Exploring
0 Comments