Are you wasting your carrot tops? For years, we've cluelessly binned the long green tops from our carrots until recently when we received some wise advice to use them for a pesto! From carrot root to tip, you can now use the full vegetable and benefit from the fibrous, nutrient rich ends which are high in vitamin A, vitamin C, calcium and iron. So without further ado, here is our roasted rainbow carrot with carrot top pesto recipe.
Ingredients:
1kg baby rainbow carrots
3 cups carrot tops
1/2 cup fresh basil leaves
1/4 cup pine nuts
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon minced garlic
Squeeze of lemon
1/4 cup grated Parmesan
1 teaspoon salt
Method:
1. Preheat fan forced oven to 180 degrees.
2. Wash carrots, trim off tops and separate leaves from stalks.
3. Line a baking tray, then place baby carrots in, drizzle with olive oil and season with salt & pepper.
4. Place baking tray in preheated oven for approximately 30 minutes (depending on carrot size) or until carrots are tender.
5. Using a food processor, add in carrot tops, basil leaves, pine nuts, garlic, grated Parmesan, and salt, then blitz until finely chopped. Add in olive oil and blitz again until all ingredients combine to form a paste.
6. Once carrots have finished roasting, leave to rest for 5 minutes then plate up, spooning on desired amount of carrot top pesto!
As part of our dish, we added chunks of Persian feta and served alongside slices of roast pork loin.
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