This crunchy salad comes alive from the combination of ample sized raw carrot pieces, succulent Cara Cara oranges, arugula, seeds, and a tahini dressing, and is sits apart from the rest of the salad crowd with its soft ripened cheese garnish.
The origin of this recipe
This recipe was wholly inspired by a late crop of tiny carrots I harvested from my garden, carrot tops and all. The carrot tops were so beautiful, I tasted them and was struck by their very carrot-like flavor! From here I quickly drizzled some tahini over the carrots, seasoned some pumpkin seeds with my Furikake Seasoning, reached for some bits of a favorite soft ripened cheese to garnish, added a dash of balsamic and dug in. It honestly was stupendous and I got to work fleshing out a real recipe.
Shredding carrots, or peeling them into ribbons can make this super crunchy vegetable more palatable and as a result, many recipes call for this preparation, but I wanted a more substantial bite into the carrot to get the full carrot flavor, hence I’ve used larger shapes for this salad. The carrot tops are not necessary, but mixed with arugula are not only delicious but a great way to reduce food waste.
What you’ll love about this recipe!
🍚 Subtle Asian flavors: The mix of both toasted sesame and seaweed mixed with salt, sugar, and spice creates an umami punch and crunch with amazing flavors in the furikake seasoning that is used in the dressing, as well as the toasted pumpkin seeds.
🥣 Easy: Your likely on hand carrots, citrus, greens and seeds are mixed with a simple dressing for a great combo.
🍽️ Unique: This salad uses bigger pieces of carrot, in place of grated or ribboned pieces, that are more commonly used. Adding citrus, infusing with furikake and other seeds, and garnishing with a soft ripened cheese, creates a unique salad that hits all the salad flavor necessities such as bite, crunch, tang, bitter, smooth and rich (usually olive oil provides this richness, but tahini and our cheese garnish does so here).
Ingredient notes and substitutions
- Carrots: This recipe uses smaller carrots versus the very large, less flavorful variety. I encourage you to try and find these, and even better if they have carrot tops attached, so you can enjoy the carroty flavor of the greens. If not, however, your garden grocery store variety of kinda large carrots will work, you will just have to cut them up a bit more.
- Arugula: this bitter and nutty green is the ideal choice, but you could substitute the often forgotten watercress which is milder but delicious. You could also sub with larger varieties of microgreens which are often widely available and quite tasty (though expensive). Salad greens will work, but it’s just not the same. This is a carrot and arugula salad.
- Citrus: I use my favorite sweet orange, the Cara Cara, but tart blood oranges or grapefruit would all give a nice tangy contrast. Your garden variety of orange will work as well, but with less distinct flavor.
- Seeds: seasoned and toasted pumpkin seeds are included as are sesame seeds in the furikake seasoning.
- Dressing ingredients: this is barely a dressing, it’s just tahini and some rice wine vinegar. You can sub any vinegar you want. I chose the mild flavored Asian vinegar.
- Soft ripened cheese: in place of a typical salty dry cheese choice such as feta or parmesan, I’m going in with the complex flavors of a soft ripened cheese. You could sub in fresh soft goat cheese if you are not a fan of brie or these types of cheeses.
Step-by-step instructions
Prep the carrots and toast the pumpkin seeds: After tossing the pumpkin seeds with a bit of oil and furikake seasoning (store bought or my Furikake Seasoning Recipe, toast them in a preheated oven for about ten minutes while you proceed to chop the carrots into diagonal slices. See recipe card for details.
Prep the rest of the ingredients: Section the oranges without the pith and cube the soft ripened cheese and put both aside.
Mix the salad dressing: Mix a very simple salad dressing by whisking together the tahini, vinegar, furikake seasoning. Depending on the state of the tahini (running and smooth, or more separated from sitting on the pantry shelf longer), you will add in a small amount of olive and/or water, and continue to whsk until the dressing is smooth.
Above: on the left you can see how the tahini fat and solids are a bit separated. At this point I am whisking in some olive oil, and then a bit of water to achieve the consistency shown on the right.
Dollop the dressing over the carrots, arugula and half of the pumpkin seeds as shown below, then toss thoroughly.
Arrange the rest of the ingredients (oranges, cheese, rest of pumpkin seeds) on top of the carrots and arugula.
Finally, garnish with extra furikake.
Tips for making and serving this salad
- Toss thoroughly: the beauty of this salad is how easily the sturdy carrots and arugula can be tossed with the conservative amount of tahini dressing, which contains little oil. It is a dryer dressing, which includes the crunchy furikake seasoning and creates a flavorful, but not overly dressed salad. Tossing these two ingredients thoroughly in the dressing, makes is easy to arrange the rest of the seeds, orange sections and cheese on top of the salad for a great presentation. It also keeps the citrus and cheese intact, versus being drowned in the dressing.
- Prep ahead: you can easily prep all ingredients without dressing, and set aside in fridge until you are ready to serve. Keep the tahini dressing at room temp for an hour before serving to make it easy to toss. Cut the soft ripened cheese straight from the fridge, just before serving.
- Extra flavor: feel free (especially if you make my homemade furikake), to generously garnish servings of the salad with more furikake seasoning for a real flavor bomb. See below.
Other recipes using my furikake seasoning
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Crunchy Carrot and Arugula Salad with Seeds, Citrus, and Tahini
Ingredients
Salad Ingredients
- 6 medium carrots (1 lb total) (with carrot tops if you want-see notes)
- 1 bunch carrot tops (if you carrots came with tops!)
- 4 cups arugula (3 oz total)
- 1-2 oranges (cara cara or blood orange top choices)
- 1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
- 2 oz soft ripened cheese (see notes)
- 1 tbsp furikake (also used in dressing (3 tbsp total))
- 2 tsp olive oil (also used in dressing (4 tsp total))
Dressing Ingredients
- 2 tbsp tahini
- 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
- 2 tsp olive oil (or water)
- 2 tbsp furikake (plus a little extra for garnish)
Method:
Prep Salad Ingredients (20 min to chop/slice/toast seeds)
- Preheat oven to 350
- If your carrots came with tops, remove the 1 bunch carrot tops , trim the stems, wash and roughly chop the carrot tops and set aside.
- Clean (and peel if desired) 6 medium carrots (1 lb total), then slice on the diagonal into 1/4-3/8" wide slices. Ref. photo in post for guidance. This is not the typical way carrots are prepped for salad, and makes for nice crunchy pieces. See notes.
- Prep 1-2 oranges into sections. See notes.
- Toss 1/2 cup pumpkin seeds with 2 tsp olive oil and 1 tbsp furikake and toast in preheated oven for approximately 10 min, until a bit toasted (not too dark- taste if you are unsure).
- Cut the 2 oz soft ripened cheese into small pieces and set aside.
Make Salad Dressing (5 min to mix ingredients)
- Use fork or whisk to briskly whisk together the 2 tbsp tahini, 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar, 2 tbsp furikake, and 2 tsp olive oil (or water) until smooth. See notes.
Assemble Salad (5 min to arrange and mix with dressing)
- Place the 4 cups arugula (3 oz total), prepped carrots, and half of the toasted pumpkin seeds on a serving platter and mix with the dressing so that all pieces are coated. You will see that this is not an overly dressed salad. Arrange the orange slices and cheese over the salad, and sprinkle the rest of the pumpkin seeds and a bit of extra furikake over the salad and serve. See notes.
