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This carrot salad is fresh and healthy, with a tangy vinaigrette dressing! It’s easy to make, ideal for cookouts, potlucks, as a side dish, or for lunch.

Carrot salad
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Carrot salad might sound humble, but it’s anything but. Serve this carrot salad to your friends and family, and they’ll be singing your praises! We know because after we made this at our house, it disappeared within minutes. It’s simple and refreshing, featuring strings of carrots doused in a a tangy Mediterranean-style vinaigrette. Just a handful of ingredients and you have a healthy side dish you won’t want to stop eating. Here’s how to make it!

Ingredients for carrot salad

This carrot salad is based on the French carrot salad, or salade de carottes râpées meaning “salad of grated carrots.” Per David Lebovitz, it’s sold all over the country at bistros, cafes and supermarkets. And we can see why! The light tangy dressing, crunchy carrots and savory sweet flavor all meld together into a dreamy concoction. The flavors are a little like what keeps us going back to the bowl of broccoli slaw or coleslaw.

Here are the ingredients you’ll need to make this simple carrot salad:

  • Carrots: large or small (more about carrots here)
  • Green onions
  • Parsley
  • White wine vinegar
  • Dijon mustard
  • Sugar or maple syrup: use maple if you like no refined sugar recipes
  • Olive oil & salt
Carrot salad

How to julienne carrots: 3 ways!

The only hard part of this carrot salad, if there is one, is how to julienne the carrots. You can grate the carrots if you’d like, but we love the look of a good julienne. Julienne cut is cutting a vegetable into long thin matchsticks. The slices have squared off edges. You can julienne carrots with a knife if you’d like. But for this salad, there are a few faster ways:

  1. Handheld peeler: Use a handheld julienne peeler. Here’s the one we use.
  2. Food processor: Use the grating blade on a food processor. Feed in the carrots through the hole in the top of the lid.
  3. Grater: Here’s a shortcut: use the large holes on a box grater! Grated carrots are in flatter pieces than julienne, but they’ll work in a pinch.
Carrot salad

Use the Dijon mustard dressing on any salad!

The dressing for this salad is simple and tangy: made with Djion mustard, vinegar and olive oil. It’s actually a half recipe of our famous Dijon mustard dressing. It’s a vinaigrette that works on just about anything! Here are some salads it would be perfect on:

Storage info

Because this type of French carrot salad is designed to sit in a cafe or grocery store counter, it stands up to time well. You can store it refrigerated for up to 3 days, and the flavor still stays fresh and tangy. If it loses a little flavor after refrigerating, you can always mix with a little drizzle of white wine vinegar, olive oil and a pinch of salad.

Easy carrot salad

Ways to serve carrot salad

This carrot salad is perfect for lots of occasions: potlucks, cookouts, to accompany a dinner main dish, or even for lunches! Here are a few ways to serve it:

Got parsley to use up? Try more of our Best Parsley Recipes.

This simple carrot salad is…

Vegetarian, vegan, plant-based, dairy-free and gluten-free.

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Carrot salad

Simple Carrot Salad


5 Stars 4 Stars 3 Stars 2 Stars 1 Star

5 from 3 reviews

  • Author: Sonja Overhiser
  • Prep Time: 15 minutes
  • Cook Time: 0 minutes
  • Total Time: 15 minutes
  • Yield: 4 1x
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Description

This carrot salad is fresh and healthy, with a tangy vinaigrette dressing! It’s easy to make, ideal for cookouts, potlucks, as a side dish, or for lunch.


Ingredients

Scale
  • 1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
  • ½ tablespoon Dijon mustard
  • 1 teaspoon sugar or maple syrup
  • ½ teaspoon kosher salt
  • 3 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 pound carrots, julienned (3 cups)
  • 2 green onions
  • 3 tablespoons chopped parsley

Instructions

  1. In a medium bowl, whisk together the white wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, sugar or maple syrup, and kosher salt. Gradually mix in the olive oil.
  2. Julienne the carrots using a julienne peeler, with the grating blade on a food processor, or using the large grate holes of a box grater (this will do but the pieces aren’t as pretty).
  3. Thinly slice the green onions. Finely chop the parsley.
  4. Add all the vegetables to the bowl with the dressing and stir to combine. Serve immediately or refrigerate for up to 3 days.
  • Category: Side Dish
  • Method: Raw
  • Cuisine: Mediterranean
  • Diet: Vegan

More carrot recipes

Carrots are a classic veggie that’s always a tasty addition to healthy side dishes. Here are some more standout carrot recipes:

About the authors

Sonja & Alex

Hi, we’re Alex and Sonja Overhiser, married cookbook authors, food bloggers, and recipe developers. We founded A Couple Cooks to share fresh, seasonal recipes and the joy of cooking! Our recipes are made by two real people and work every time.

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6 Comments

  1. Alice says:

    This dressing transformed my boring carrots into a delicious salad!! So simply, yet so mighty. My family loved it (even those who aren’t fond of vegetables). Thank you for sharing this, Sonja and Alex.






    1. Alex Overhiser says:

      You’re welcome! Thank you for making it.

  2. Stéphanie D says:

    Made it with white rice vinegar instead of wine vinegar, and it was still very good! Nice combination of flavours.

  3. Irene R says:

    My husband does not eat many vegetables, but had seconds of this! I made it all in the food processor, except the green onions. Put all the dressing ingredients in the FP bowl with the chopping blade, and ran it for 15-20 seconds. Tossed in the parsley and pulsed until It was nicely chopped. Removed and wiped off the chopping blade, then put on the shredding disc. Shredded all the peeled carrots into the bowl. Sliced the green onions and and dropped them in the bowl. Stirred everything together, then put it in the serving dish and stirred everything once more. A winner!!






  4. Noureddine Bassori says:

    Very nice and good salad.






  5. Samantha says:

    This is perfect. I always end up buying more carrot than I need and wondering what to do with all the extra ones. This salad will be perfect addition to my simple dinner nights when I do one dish simple meals. Thanks for this easy recipe.