Carottes râpées - too simple to mess with?
"it’s one of those things, the simpler the better. Simple restaurants like Chartier just toss a plate of carrots at you with a wedge of lemon."
David Lebovitz
I don't think that's quite true because of the above picture on the left which I found. The lemons here seemed to have been whipped into a slightly eggy looking sauce. I suspect he was really talking about something like the one on the right from Leite's Culinaria.
And this is something else again - Sesame and Aleppo carrot râpée from Ottolenghi which featured in an Ottolenghi newsletter about messing around with classic recipes - as well as reminding us of the basic rules of salads - because his other chosen classic was Waldorf salad:
"The quick version: choose a hero ingredient and let everything else play a supporting role. Build in contrast and layers - sweet against salty, soft against crunchy, warm against cool. And make it look beautiful: a good platter, our splatter-spoon technique, wells in the base dip for the oil to pool in."
How does it vary from the original? Well with sesame - oil, seeds and tahini plus some Aleppo chilli flakes. Does he have the right to play with a classic? Yes of course he does. Is it better? Well that's a personal thing isn't it and anyway we can still have the original if we choose. The classic is a classic for a reason and generally speaking stays the way it was created.
That said it's always difficult to know exactly what is the original recipe. Elizabeth David and Jane Grigson are both pretty pure and simply mention olive oil and lemon juice, maybe a shallot, a touch of sugar and/or some herbs to mix with your finely grated carrot - 'the red part only, the yellow core being discarded' says Elizabeth. And I suspect they are both right. I'm pretty sure that the carottes râpées that I ate in France had nothing else, and the carrots were indeed grated very fine. You also have to leave them to merge with the flavourings for a while, and then drain off any excess liquid. This version is possibly the closest I have seen to that - from Pinecorns and Acorns
That said there are a few other ingredients that commonly appear - a pinch of cumin - of all things - Dijon mustard and various herbs.
David Lebovitz, who may be American but lives in Paris with a French partner, tells us that:
"I don’t know why, but I do know sometimes there’s nothing more satisfying than a simple pile of grated raw carrots, lightly dressed... I resist the urge to add things to this French classic."
Except he did add mustard to his French grated carrot salad - to the initial disapproval of his French partner but: "once he tasted, agreed was a good addition." And instead of Elizabeth David's sugar he added a touch of honey - to bring out the sweetness of the carrots, especially if your carrots are not super sweet.
He also sort of succumbed by suggesting that you could also add grated beetroot - or indeed make a beetroot salad the same way - but that's a different thing and "being a Californian, I’ll confess to sometimes tossing in cubes of avocado at the last minute."
Cut to Russia and/or Korea and the viral video world.
There is also a classic Russian dish called Korean carrot salad or Koreiskaya morchovka. And this one has a history that explains the name:
"The history of this Korean Salad is twisted, but some say that ethnic Korean immigrants who immigrated to the former Soviet Union were trying to recreate Kimchi with whatever ingredients they now had, and this was how Morkovcha, or Spicy Korean Carrots, came to be. Morkovcha is a play on the Russian word for carrots – which is morkovka." Let the Baking Begin
And as you can see from this version of Spicy Korean carrots - from Let the Baking Begin it looks pretty identical to the French version. As do these two other versions that I found: Korean carrot salad - Modern Nonna; Russian carrot salad - Koreiskaya Morkova (morchovka) - Olga's Flavour Factory. One major difference to the French version seems to be to caramelise some onions in oil and then use the oil - not the onions - to flavour the salad - along with spices such as paprika, coriander and cayenne, more herbs and some garlic. Plus vinegar rather than lemon. Spicier but the same thought really.
But then the actual Koreans got into the act. Well that's what I think - anyway the viral thing is definitely Korean in flavour. I think I have referenced this Tiktok video before - the lady is American but probably of Korean heritage. She has impossibly long finger nails and refers to the recipe as skin care. As to the recipe, which does indeed look pretty good, it is definitely Korean in that there is chilli crisp as well as soy, sesame seeds and oil and rice vinegar. Now I don't know that it necessarily has any reference to the original French dish - I suspect not. I suspect it was just something to do with carrots. The crucial difference being that the carrots are not grated but very thinly sliced with your vegetable peeler.
And back in the French world and the original dish Leslie Brenner of Cooks Without Borders, has perhaps taken a hint from TikTok, and changed those grated carrots - "whose wood-shavings-like texture nearly always drags it down" into ribbons which is:
"that little bit of culinary magic: You’ve turned the dish into a plate of tangy, fresh, bright, ribbony delightfulness."
So should you mess with the original or not? And if you do mess with it - by how much? Just make ribbons instead of grated or julienned pieces? Add one more ingredient - perhaps mustard - or go a bit wild with spices and different liquids? It was actually interesting to see how little experimentation there was - maybe because it's just such a perfect thing. I do not make it very often, but when I do I always ask myself why I do not do it more often, because it's delicious and incredibly versatile too.
YEARS GONE BY
September 23
2025 - A recipe roundup
2024 - Nothing
2023 - A nifty writer's block idea
2022 - Now what?
2021 - Missing
2020 - Missing
2019 - Nothing
2017 - Steak au poivre
2016 - Lygon Street
Comments