Spicy Soy Glazed Carrots

You know the feeling when you have to clear out the fridge before a long vacation? Well, I certainly do. A couple of weeks back, we were about to embark on a two week vacation-- being interested in cooking, I hated to see that most of the produce in my fridge would go bad. My grandma had just come back from the farmers market with a sac full of rainbow carrots, and when I say sac, let's just say that there was a TON of carrots to eat. This was great planning due to the fact that we were leaving just days later. Just kidding! Anyway, I started coming up with recipes that starred carrots as the centerpiece and came up with this side dish named "Spicy Soy Glazed Carrots".

This recipe packs in so much flavor from all of the pungent ingredients like soy sauce and garlic, but the carrots married with the shishito peppers is a match made in heaven. The spiciness and sweetness come together and bear a great dish to enjoy with a side of rice or even on its own. The recipe is as follows...

Ingredients:

- rainbow carrots (can substitute with regular orange carrots as well)

- 4 cloves garlic (adjustable depending on taste)

- 3 shishito peppers (can substitute with jalapeños, serranos)

- 3 tbsp. soy sauce

- 3 tbsp. chicken stock (can substitute with water)

- pinch of salt (to taste)

Directions:

First, chop up your carrots into large pieces. You can adjust the size and even cook them whole if you prefer. Thinly slice the shishito peppers. These can normally be found at any asian grocery store, but if they are not available, jalapeños and serrano peppers work well too. If you are sensitive to spice, maybe add one pepper instead of three-- this dish is quite spicy!

Sautee the carrots in a pot and add a pinch of salt and the chopped garlic until the carrots start to develop a little color on the outside. When this happens, give it a taste to make sure there is still some bite left (we will continue to cook it and don't want the carrots to get too mushy). At this stage, add in the peppers and stir to combine. Add in the soy sauce and chicken stock, stir, and cover on medium low heat. You can substitute the chicken stock for water if you would like to make the dish vegan or vegetarian.

After about 5-10 minutes, the carrots and peppers should have soaked up all of the delicious flavors and be tender to eat. Serve it up and enjoy!