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French Grated Carrot Salad With Vinaigrette Aux Fines Herbes Dressing

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Salade De Carottes Râpées

This delicious carrot salad recipe is the perfect addition to any meal as a side salad or to serve as a starter. The Vinaigrette Aux Fines Herbes Dressing with tarragon, chives, and other tasty herbs are delightful. The color of this dish will add a pleasing effect to your meal or appetizer table and make a perfect staple to your recipe collection to use over and over!

Bright orange grated carrots with green parsley and green nasturtian leaves and orange blossoms.
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❤️About This Recipe

It can be served as part of your starters or hors d'oeuvres along with a Simple Green, Mesclun Salad, or Refreshing Red Tomato Salad to make an ultimate colorful array of the best salads for your table. Like this salad they have one main vegetable as the star ingredient.

Your family and friends will delight in the visual beauty and healthy selection of this tasty buffet.

The Complete Salad Handbook will further explain how to make vegetable salads and more.

📸Salad Ingredient Shot

Labelled ingredient photo with orange carrots, green chives, brown shelled sunflower seeds, white salt, and black pepper.

📝Salad Ingredient List

  • carrots
  • chives
  • salt and ground black pepper
  • unsalted shelled sunflower seeds
  • chickpeas (optional)
  • Vinaigrette Aux Fines Herbes Dressing Recipe (recipe below)

Vinaigrette Aux Fines Herbes Dressing Recipe

📸Vinaigrette Ingredient Shot

Labelled ingredient photo of vinaigrette au fines herbes.

📝Vinaigrette Ingredient List

  • cider or wine vinegar, but not balsamic
  • salt
  • black pepper
  • tasteless oil such as rapeseed or grapeseed oil

The following Fines Herbes

  • tarragon
  • chives
  • fennel
  • chervil or parsley
  • marjoram

🔢Vinaigrette Instructions

Green herbs mixed into clear vinegar and oil in a clear bowl with a white spatula sitting in a bed of orange grated carrots.
  1. Mix the Vinaigrette Aux Fines Herbes dressing first as it needs to stand for 10 minutes before serving to allow the flavors to meld together before serving.
  2. Place the salt and pepper in a bowl, add the vinegar, and stir with a whisk until the salt is dissolved.
  3. Stir in the oil, a little at a time and whisk briskly until the mixture is cloudy.
  4. Mix in the finely chopped herbs.
  5. Allow to stand for about 10 minutes, then whisk briskly again just before use.

🔢How To Prepare The Salad

A silver grater sitting in a clear bowl with orange carrot pieces.
  1. Peel and grate the carrots into slivers, which I like best. Or, if you prefer (and have lots of patience) julienne strips or do what the chefs favor in the World Central Kitchen Cookbook, use a potato peeler to shave the carrots into ribbons. I agree with them the ribbons create a lovely look. You can also use a food processor, mandolin, or coarse grater, or as the French say, use a "Moulinex Hachoir".

White square bowl with orange grated carrots, sprinkled with black pepper, brown shelled sunflower seeds, and green chopped chives.
  1. Place carrots in a bowl and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

The orange carrots, brown sunflower seeds, and green chives, mixed well with a brown wooden paddle, all in a white square bowl.
  1. Add the chives, and shelled sunflower seeds. Mix well.

Drizzling the green herb dressing over the orange carrot salad.
  1. Drizzle vinaigrette dressing over the ingredients and stir in intervals until the carrots are well covered, but don't let the dressing pool in the bottom of the bowl.

Orange grated carrot salad garnished with green parsley, green nasturtian leaves, and orange and yellow naturtian blooms.
  1. Garnish with a sprig of fresh parsley, or a pretty flower like the two orange nasturtians with three of their leaves from my garden.

Top Tip

A salad with one main vegetable ingredient like this one, is best sliced or cut using a tool that will ensure the pieces are uniformly sized. It would not be as enjoyable to eat if the carrots in this dish contained large hard-to-chew pieces mixed with tiny ones. The grater although, cuts slightly different sizes they are roughly an even number of all sizes and they are not that different in size one from another.

🔄Substitutions

  • Chickpeas are a tasty substitute or addition to the sunflower seeds.
  • Raisins are also a popular ingredient in a carrot salad.
  • Nuts like broken pecans or slivered almonds pair nicely with the raisins too, or on their own.

❄️Storage

You can make the dressing and prepare the carrots the day before and keep them separate and well-wrapped overnight in the fridge, then combine them just before serving.

This salad will last for a couple of days in a sealed container in the fridge, but it is at its best the day it is made. If you do keep it overnight give it a good stir before serving.

🙌Variations

  • If you were to visit one of the many open markets in France you would likely find carrot salad is a popular item. One of the main differences to this one is that the carrots would be grated very finely in julienne strings instead of pieces like the way I have done it here. You would find that the dressing used is often a Honey Mustard Dressing or Lemon Vinaigrette.

Kitchen Tools

A vegetable slicer for even pieces

More Great French Salads

  • A delicious Artichoke Salad is so easy to make and sure to impress your family and friends.
  • Salade Niçoise or also called Provençal Salad, Or Salade Nice is a classic French salad.
  • Bacon Salad is a great way to combine fresh salad leaves with delicious crispy bacon, a really tasty meal for all your family and friends.
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📖 Recipe

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Bright orange grated carrots with green parsley and green nasturtian leaves and orange blossoms.

French Grated Carrot Salad With Vinaigrette Aux Fines Herbes Dressing

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Description

Bon Appétit

Like it? ~ Let us know below!

This salad will add a beautiful colorful display for your table and give your family and friends a healthy delicious side dish.

Ingredients

Units Scale
  • 1 pound (45gm) carrots
  • 3 tablespoons chives finely chopped
  • ¼ to ½ teaspoon salt and ground black pepper
  • ½ cup unsalted shelled sunflower seeds

Vinaigrette Aux Fines Herbes Dressing Recipe

  • 1-2 tbsps of vinegar - cider or wine, but not balsamic
  • 2 pinches of salt
  • sprinkle of black pepper
  • 3 tbsps of a tasteless oil such as rapeseed or grapeseed oil

The following herbs - 3 tablespoons each finely chopped

  • chives
  • tarragon
  • fennel (optional)
  • chervil or parsley
  • 4 leaves of marjoram (Do not use more marjoram as it is rather pungent)

Instructions

Make the dressing first to give it time to meld flavors.

How To Make The Dressing

  1. Mix the Vinaigrette Aux Fines Herbes dressing first as it needs to stand for 10 minutes before serving.
  2. Place the salt and pepper in a bowl, add the vinegar, and stir with a whisk until the salt is dissolved.
  3. Stir in the oil, a little at a time and whisk briskly until the mixture is cloudy.
  4. Mix in the finely chopped herbs.
  5. Allow to stand for about 10 minutes, then whisk briskly again before use.

How To Prepare The Salad

  1. Peel and grate the carrots into slivers with a food processor, mandolin, or coarse grater, or as the French say, use a "Moulinex Hachoir".
  2. Place in a bowl and stir in the salt and pepper, then add the chives and sunflower seeds and mix well.
  3. Drizzle the vinaigrette dressing over the carrot mix and stir in intervals until the carrots are well covered, but don't let the dressing pool in the bottom of the bowl.
  4. Garnish with parsley sprigs and edible flowers and leaves.

Notes

Helpful Tips

Peel and grate the carrots into slivers, which I like best. Or, if you prefer (and have lots of patience) julienne strips or do what the chefs favor in The World Central Kitchen Cookbook, use a potato peeler to shave the carrots into ribbons. I agree with them the ribbons create a lovely look. You can also use a food processor, mandolin, or coarse grater, or as the French say, use a "Moulinex Hachoir".

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  • Prep Time: 15 minutes
  • Cook Time: N/A
  • Category: Salad
  • Method: chopping
  • Cuisine: French

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