Peas and Carrots Taste Great Together
“Peas went with carrots as infallibly as ham went with eggs. For years I thought carrots and peas grew on the same vine.” (Peg Bracken)
Yes, plenty of food science delves into why certain foods pair particularly well together. For now, though, we’ll skip over the scientific lingo and simply quote Farmer Lee Jones, who says, “peas and carrots go together like a sock and a shoe.”
In 2018, when Farmer Lee was becoming nostalgic about his favorite summer crops, we asked him about carrots and peas, and this is just some of what he said.
Carrots, he explained, are an excellent early summer vegetable because they like the cold temperatures and can, therefore, be planted early. By early summer, you can already enjoy the best of these farm-fresh beauties. Farmer Lee shared how petite carrots can provide the ultimate flavor while being the “littlest cuties of the garden.”
Peas can be planted early, too, with “old-timers” specifically picking March 17th to plant their peas. Farmer Lee says that, although there is nothing magical about that date regarding planting, it is important to plant peas at just the right time—which often falls right about that date.
He suggests pairing your fresh-mixed carrots with equally farm-fresh petite-mixed snow peas for an unforgettable yet incredibly simple dish. Then, to carry the freshness theme to the ultimate, top these delicious summer veggies with farm-fresh parsley.
Voilà! Done.
Flavorful Duo Packs a One-Two Nutritional Powerhouse
Individually, each of these fresh vegetables provides plenty of health benefits, and “when they’re paired, they become a powerhouse of antioxidants and nutrients.”
A cup of peas and a cup of carrots combined have only 167 calories, with “barely a trace of fat.” Together, they provide 16 percent of men’s daily protein intake and 19 percent for women. This peas-and-carrots combo provides fiber to help keep your digestive tract in good health and a rainbow of four different carotenoids that help with vision, providing protection from macular degeneration and cataracts and giving you more healthy skin.
The vitamin C in this combo supports the immune system and can help prevent cell damage that can lead to chronic health issues. Vitamin C has been shown to help lower your risk for cardiovascular disease (University Hospitals calls carrots one of the ten most heart-healthy vegetables) and some types of cancer.
This doesn’t even begin to cover what vitamin K and B vitamins in these fresh vegetables can help health-wise. By the way, note that we’re talking about fresh carrots and peas. Frozen and canned versions “lose about half of their vitamin C, folate, and potassium” while adding significant amounts of sodium.
Plus, when you eat a variety of colors in your fruits and vegetables, this “seems to equal better overall health, especially in relation to produce. ‘Epidemiological research suggests that food patterns that include fruits and vegetables are associated with lower risk for some diseases.’”
Forrest Gump Talks About ‘Em
“From that day on, we was always together. Jenny and me was like peas and carrots.”
The character of Forrest Gump, played by Tom Hanks, was so filled with wisdom that, more than two decades after the award-winning film was released, people are still creating web pages that share his wise sayings.
For now, we’ll share just one more. “My mama,” Forrest said, “always told me that miracles happen every day. Some people don’t think so, but they do.”
If you ever doubt this, then talk to a farmer. We’re blessed to observe miracles occurring every single day of our lives as we work with Mother Nature to do our part.
Peas and Carrots Look Stunning Together
Even if you simply consider the traditional colors of each, the contrast between the vivid orange and eye-catching green makes for a beautiful plate. And, you can also add other hues in startling ways. For example, Our mixed snow peas offer a rainbow of colors, from green to gold and purple. The speckled snow pea provides unique, mottled coloring in red and gold—and our pea blossoms add beautiful mixed hues. You can also choose pea blossoms that are entirely stunningly white.
Our cobalt carrots, meanwhile, offer up dark purple roots with a white core. Dragon carrots? They provide a deep purple exterior and a fiery orange interior to your dishes, while our mixed carrots come in surprising shades of orange, red, peach, violet, white, and yellow.
Ditch the Safety Knife
In 1929, the Safety Pea Knife was created, called the “invention of the age” that “defies the law of gravity.” This knife’s blade contained a slot to prevent peas from rolling off and back onto the plate or onto the table or floor. It also helped to solve the problem experienced by people who felt that, when eating peas with a spoon, “you’re done too soon!”
We can relate to wanting more farm-fresh peas than what’s on your plate, but we also want to permit you to eat your peas with whatever cutlery you have. In fact, we’re perfectly fine with anyone who wants to shell peas and eat them by hand, just like you might have done on Grandma’s front porch.
Coverage about this invention shares how “Now You Can Eat Your PEAS With Ease.” The writer also discussed how some people who tried this Safety Pea Knife at a Rotary luncheon in 1929 loved it and wanted it to become standard table fare for club meetings. Others, though, had some concerns; most notably, “other Rotarians of a more cautious nature forestalled this headlong move, pointing out that while the idea of the knife is good, it hasn’t been perfected to the point of real safety yet. It holds the peas all right but needs a hilt to keep the user from mutilating his tonsils.”
The article concludes with a practical recommendation. Add a bit of honey if you want to balance your peas without the risk of tonsil mutilation. As another idea (okay, so this one is ours), use the spoon—and then simply ask for “more peas, please!”
Homemade Vegetable Pot Pie Recipe
Nothing, explains Culinary Vegetable Institute Chef Jamie Simpson, is off limits in a pot pie. “This a great way,” he adds, “to utilize vegetables in the peak of their season in a dish any family can get behind.”
Here’s Chef Jamie’s pot pie recipe. To celebrate your fresh carrots and peas, you simply need to change this line from his recipe—2 ½ cups of small diced vegetables—to 2 ½ cups of peas and diced carrots.
Yep. Voilà! Done.
Peas and Carrots for Dessert
Use your imagination to shape your Peas and Carrots Ice Cream Sandwiches (the recipe for the sweet pea ice cream and carrot cake freezer cookies is here), indulging in these fantastic sandwiches in a way that changes your unique world. Be playful with this peas and carrot recipe. Have fun! Enjoy.
Deeper Dive on Fresh Carrots
“If you truly get in touch with a piece of carrot, you get in touch with the soil, the rain, the sunshine. You get in touch with Mother Earth and eating in such a way you feel in touch with true life, with roots.” (Nhat Hanh)
In 2019, The Chef’s Garden and the Culinary Vegetable Institute teamed up to name mixed carrots as the veggie of the year. One of the reasons we chose mixed carrots is that they’re incredibly versatile and brilliantly used in salads, soups, stews, and more. They’re marvelous in smoothies, delicious when raw—often paired with creative dips—and, as chefs continue to replace grain-based carbs with veggie-based ones, we expect that carrot noodles will appear more and more often on the plate.
Farm-fresh carrots can be:
- baked
- boiled
- pulped
- pureed
- fried
- grated
- steamed
- mashed
- dehydrated
In fact, as part of the Culinary Vegetable Institute’s zero waste kitchen policy, Chef Jamie Simpson created a glossy, velvety, thick, complex, vibrantly colored, and intensely flavored carrot puree that puts the entire carrot to work, including the feathery tops.
Deeper Dive on Fresh Peas
“I remember, around age three, peas growing in the back garden. Pinching them from their pods and popping them in the mouth was my first realisation that food came from somewhere other than a shelf.” (Caitlin Moran)
Different kinds of peas offer differing flavors and textures—and, of course, they each look unique on the plate. English peas, for example, have a delicately delicious flavor, and they pair perfectly with mint (there are so many varieties that you can experiment with!), tarragon, and chervil—as well as the suggestion of Farmer Lee Jones earlier in this post: farm-fresh parsley.
On our blog, you can find even more information about peas’ well-rounded beauty and flavor.
Plus, what about adding pea tendrils to your creative dishes and menus? They offer the mildly sweet yet earthy flavor of raw pea, with delicious leaves and stems.
In 2018, we posted an overview of the amazing fresh pea and recommended a Chilled Sorrel and Pea Soup recipe by Elizabeth Schneider that includes sorrel, pea, rice, onion, buttermilk, whipping cream, and more. Plus, here’s a look at a special evening at the Culinary Vegetable Institute, where, for dessert, chefs created a luscious Pea Cake, Pea Sorbet, and Pea Caramel with lemon verbena, lemon balm, and pea bloom.
Moving Quality Peas and Carrots Forward
The plant-forward movement continues to progress, with more plates containing vegetables. This means that there is an increasing demand for high-quality, earth-grown, farm-fresh ingredients, including peas and carrots. These fresh veggies must please customers’ palates and satisfy their demand for sustainably farmed, responsibly sourced, highly nutritious, flavorful food.
As Farmer Lee points out, at The Chef’s Garden, we produce crops of quality, value, and integrity. Our conscientious farm team focuses on growing these crops in an almost spiritual, holistic, healthy, and meaningful way. The goal is always to grow a wide variety of superior-quality, unique, specialty vegetables using regenerative farming practices that enrich the land rather than depleting its nutrients.
We grow our crops, including our farm-fresh carrots and peas, with purpose. We share stories about how we sustainably farm the food we provide to chefs and home cooks, growing them according to the flow of nature’s seasons and relentlessly providing them with what they want and need.
As your personal farmer, we’re here to grow virtually anything that your creativity inspires. We continuously develop new product sizes, colors, textures, and flavors for you to taste that we hope will galvanize your imagination, spark a fresh idea, and keep your guests marveling at the dishes you serve them.
We hand-harvest products daily, picking to order and then shipping them overnight to ensure that you’ll receive the freshest peas, carrots, and other products with incredible flavor and prolonged shelf life. In fact, we’re confident that you’ll find our fresh vegetables, microgreens, herbs, and edible flowers to be the freshest and most flavorful anywhere—and we invite you to explore what’s in season right now.
We also invite you to contact us today to share what products you plan to incorporate into your creative dishes and menus! We’re here to help.