A hearty and satisfying dish that is great for parties or as a go-to snack, carrot hummus is loaded with fresh flavors and includes a perfect balance of sweet and savory

Ingredients: 

2 pounds carrots
2 medium-sized shallots
3 tablespoons lemon oil
3 tablespoons almond oil
2 tablespoons tamari
1 1/2 teaspoons Aleppo pepper
2 tablespoons garlic confit
Lemon juice to taste
Salt to taste

Directions: 

Dice the carrots and shallots to a medium dice. Since we will puree the vegetables once they are cooked, the cut can be rough — the key here is to have sufficient surface area to caramelize.

Toss the veggies lightly with oil and spread them out evenly on a baking tray with parchment paper. Cook at 400° until golden brown and cooked all the the way through, about a half hour. Check at 15 minutes and then rotate.

While the carrots and shallots cook, combine all other ingredients in a food processor.

Once the carrots and shallots are cooked, pull them from the oven and let them cool. Blend with the rest of the ingredients until smooth.

Add salt and lemon juice to taste. You shouldn’t necessarily taste sour or salty, but it is all a matter of preference. When you taste the hummus and start salivating, the seasoning is in a good place.

Serving: ~¾ quart of hummus

A very versatile dish that can be served and prepared many different ways including:

• Serve in a bowl topped with a salad of fresh herbs, toasted nuts, thinly sliced radishes and baby carrots
• Pair with dill, mint, tarragon, oregano, chive and parsley. This combination provides a truly rich flavor that leaves you satisfied but refreshed.
• Generously sprinkle with a classic everything spice such as dried onion, sesame seeds, and lightly toasted poppy seeds.
• Great for dipping and spreading on crackers, or on a piece of toast.

Variations and Serving Suggestions

Smoky flavors pair very well with this dish. Add a pinch of smoked paprika or Urfa chilies, a lovely Turkish chili that is smoked and fermented and found at specialty spice shops.

For ambitious home cooks, the following variation that brings the texture much closer to a traditional chickpea hummus that is sure to impress.

• Before roasting your carrots, they can be smoked over a grill. Lightly salt them and rub with desired seasonings, such as paprika and dried chilies, and let them sit in the fridge overnight. If you have a vac sealer at home, you can seal them to enhance the carrots absorption of the spice flavors while purging excess moisture through the salt, essentially “curing” them.
• Rinse the carrots and pat dry. Roast or sauté the carrots until they are nicely caramelized and cooked through. Place them in a dehydrator on low or an oven on the lowest setting and allow them to dry out for four to six hours.
• Roast the shallots as normal; combine all the ingredients in a food processor and blend until smooth. It will take a bit longer and you’ll need to stop to scrape the edges with a spatula to get a nice consistency

Ingredient info:

Lemon oil – Carried in most stores, but you can make your own by steeping lemon peels in a high quality olive oil. Let it sit for a few days at room temperature and then move it to the fridge for up to a month before straining out the peels. The oil will stay fresh in the fridge almost indefinitely.

Almond oil – A bit harder to track down, but specialty stores will carry this.

Aleppo pepper – A very mild dry chili from the Mediterranean area. This can be substituted with any chili flake you desire.

Tamari – Simply soy sauce brewed without gluten. Can be found in most stores.

Garlic confit – Easy to find in stores, but you can also make this at home. It’s a delicious condiment to have around the house and is useful in many other recipes. Fill a pot about ⅓ of the way with peeled garlic cloves (cut off the ends if you prefer, but it makes only a very subtle difference) and cover with oil – any will do. Cook the garlic on very low heat with a lid for at least an hour, checking occasionally to observe the color of the garlic. More color will produce a sweeter flavor, so it’s a matter of preference. Pull the garlic off the heat and let it cool for a half hour, strain out the oil and blend the garlic. As a bonus you get garlic oil as well!