Roasted Rainbow Carrots with Carrot Top Salsa Verde

May 17, 2026

Prep: 15m

Cook: 30m

Total: 45m

Rainbow carrots roasted and topped with a bright salsa verde made from the carrot tops themselves, plus mint, chives, anchovy, and lemon. A zero-waste, garden-to-plate side dish. I made this one to pair with Sauvignon Blanc, a wine that loves grassy, green, citrus-forward flavors.

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Rainbow carrots roasted and topped with a bright salsa verde made from the carrot tops themselves, plus mint, chives, anchovy, and lemon. A zero-waste, garden-to-plate side dish.

The carrot top revelation

I used to compost my carrot tops. But, with a glut of rainbow carrots from the garden, it felt wrong to throw away that much green when I was buying parsley by the bunch for sauces. So I tried them. Once. Carrot tops taste like a deeply herbal cousin of parsley. They are more assertive raw than parsley, a little grassier and slightly bitter on the very edges, but chopped into a salsa verde with mint and chives and anchovy and lemon, that bitterness becomes the herbal backbone the sauce needed.

What makes this work

A few decisions that move this dish from fine to memorable:

Roast the carrots hard. Most home cooks pull carrots out of the oven too early,. Push them slightly past tender, to the point where the cut sides look like burnt-orange leather and the edges have crisped a little. 30 minutes at 425°F, flipping once. That a little caramelization is where the sweetness lives, and it’s what gives the salsa something to play against.
Anchovy, not capers. The original version of this sauce used capers. I tried it with three oil-packed anchovy fillets instead, and the depth shift was real. The anchovy disappears into the sauce (no fishy flavor), but it brings a savory backbone.

Ingredient highlights

Rainbow carrots with their tops on (1½ pounds). This is the dish, and the dish gets dramatically better when the carrots are good. Look for slim-to-medium carrots, never the bagged-and-trimmed kind. The tops should look perky and bright green, not yellowed or wilted, which is your indicator that the carrots themselves are fresh. Rainbow varieties make the platter spectacular, and each color has a subtly different flavor: purple carrots are earthier, white ones are sweeter and milder, orange ones are the most classic carrot taste.

Grow tip: Carrots love sandy, loose, rock-free soil and cool weather. In Zone 9 to 10, plant seeds in October and again in February for spring and late-spring harvests. They are slow to germinate (two to three weeks) and slow to grow (60 to 80 days to maturity), but they ask almost nothing of you in the meantime. [CARMEN: 1 to 2 sentences about your specific garden carrots: variety mix (Cosmic Purple, Atomic Red, Pusa Rudhira, Lunar White, Solar Yellow?), when you planted them, what the harvest was like, anything about the soil or location.] Thin ruthlessly when the seedlings are 2 inches tall (snip with scissors so you don’t disturb the neighbors) and you’ll get the slim, well-shaped roots that roast best. The tops you’d otherwise throw out are your free salsa verde.

Carrot tops (1 cup tightly packed, lower stems trimmed). Pull off the leaves and tender upper stems. Discard the woody main stems at the base. If you bought the carrots and the tops look a little tired, give them a 15-minute bath in cold water to revive them before chopping. They should smell green and faintly carroty when you crush a leaf between your fingers. If they smell like nothing, they’re too old.

Oil-packed anchovy fillets (3). The unsung hero of this sauce. Spend the extra two dollars on Ortiz, Cento, or Agostino Recca, packed in good olive oil. The supermarket tinned anchovies that have been sitting in murky liquid are the reason people think they hate anchovies. Three fillets, finely chopped or smashed into the oil, melt into the sauce and become a deep, savory hum. No fishy flavor. Just better sauce.

Mint and chives (¼ cup each, finely chopped). The mint brings cool sweetness that softens the grassiness of the carrot tops. The chives bring a quiet onion note that pulls everything toward the carrots. If you don’t have chives, sub a tablespoon of finely sliced scallion green. If you don’t have mint, sub more chives, not parsley (parsley duplicates what the carrot tops are already doing).

Lemon (1 whole lemon, zest plus 2 tablespoons juice). Use a Meyer lemon if you’ve got one, regular if not. Both work. Zest first, juice second. The acid is what brings the whole salsa together and makes the carrots taste like something other than themselves.

Tips and swaps

No carrot tops? Sub 1 cup of flat-leaf parsley (tightly packed, tender stems included). Different flavor, still beautiful, but you lose the moment.
One color is fine. Standard orange carrots make this dish perfectly. The rainbow is a visual upgrade, not a flavor one. Use what you have or what looks best at the market.
Don’t peel young carrots. A good scrub with a vegetable brush is enough, and the skin holds onto more flavor than the peel pile. Peel only if the carrots are older and a little tough.
The salsa holds for 24 hours in the fridge. The carrot tops can go a little dark and bruised overnight. If making ahead, make the salsa and store covered with a thin layer of olive oil on top to slow oxidation.
Anchovy doubters: sub 1 tablespoon finely chopped capers and a pinch of extra salt. You’ll lose the depth but keep the salinity.
Make it a meal by serving over a bed of butter beans or chickpeas dressed with a little of the salsa.

Carrots