Feeling like a sweet succulent salad? This carrot and pumpkin salad will satisfy you! My body is just calling for vegetables and salads this week probably due to an unhealthy (relatively) holiday last week. Today, I’m injecting beta-carotene into my body.
Yellow vegetables, like carrots and pumpkins, are so high in anti-oxidants, vitamins (especially carotenes and vit-A) and dietary fibre. On top of that, they are low in calories and fat. They do all the wonderful magics to your body – improving your vision, cancer prevention, anti-aging, healthy skin, cleansing, etc. You cannot ask more, can you?
Carrots are a great snack as well as side dishes. You can have it as raw with yummy hummus or soft cheese. But when it’s cooked, beta-carotene can be absorbed to your body about five times more than when eaten raw. The reason being is a cooking process helps to dissolve a resistant cell wall of the carrots that locks in the beta-carotene. So you can maximise health benefits by cooking them. It is better to cook the whole carrots (e.g. boiling) before cutting or mashing them to preserve nutrients. Another way is like me, I chopped them up with butternut pumpkins and quickly cook in a frying pan with a teaspoon of coconut oil. You can add a drizzle of honey, balsamic vinegar, cumin seeds to enhance the flavour. Sage is one of the herbs that merry very well with carrots. I loved a smell of sage caramelising with carrots in a pan and also the colour – intense orange/ yellow plus beautiful caramelisation on the outside! Yummy lunch served so easy:)