For Better Roasted Carrots, Give Them The Blackened Treatment

Aside from making the occasional bakery-worthy carrot cake or succulent oven-roasted glazed carrots, these colorful root veggies are often viewed as rather banal. Even in the aforementioned dishes, carrots are little more than a nutrient-dense vehicle for sweet, decadent flavor, and though delicious, it can get boring pretty quickly. If you want to make carrots the star of your dinner table without reaching for brown sugar or cinnamon, what you need is blackened seasoning.

Originating among Cajun and Creole cooks throughout the Louisiana region — particularly New Orleans — blackened seasoning is much less spicy than other seasoning blends in the region. Instead, it focuses on deep, smoky flavors and is typically a blend of paprika, garlic powder, onion powder, black pepper, thyme, basil, oregano, and a touch of cayenne. When used to blacken fish, chicken, or even alligator, the meat is coated in these seasonings and seared in a scalding hot pan. When the spices meet hot fat, they create a dark, charred crust of flavor.

When applied to carrots, blackened seasoning turns into a savory, earthy crust that beautifully melds a carrot's natural sweetness, pushing it away from candy-sweet and into barbecue territory. Searing them over high heat also makes them tender, almost velvety, without making them mushy — especially if you keep them mostly intact, so the seasoning has something to grab onto. Halve larger carrots and keep medium to small ones whole for a dish that's incredibly flavorful and fairly easy to make.

Though you can make delicious, blackened carrots just from coating them in fat and blackened seasoning and then searing to perfection, there's less chance of burning if you sear the crust on the stovetop first and finish them in the oven. Since carrots are more fibrous and denser than animal protein, giving them some time to mellow out in the oven ensures they're hot and tender all the way through — especially since you're cooking them whole or nearly whole.

Oven roasting them for a bit also gives you plenty of time to work on other dishes, such as your favorite honey bourbon BBQ chicken, panko-coated fried catfish, or tender and juicy pulled pork. In general, the best dishes to pair with blackened carrots will be from the same or nearby regions, ensuring all the flavors in your meal complement each other and nothing clashes or gets overshadowed. However, you could also draw inspiration from other cuisines that use a wide array of spices, such as South Asian butter chicken or lentil-forward dal.

To take this dish over the top, a simple dressing or sauce to drizzle over your carrots adds a little bit of moisture and softens any potential bitterness in the blackened seasoning. Tangy remoulades are perfect for this, especially if you're serving your blackened carrots alongside crab cakes or spicy chicken croquettes, though you could also use a citrusy, herb-heavy vinaigrette.