Carrot Fritters

Well hello healthy goodness! I have a new obsession... and it's carrot fritters. A few weeks back I was prepping for St. Paddy's week on the blog and had so many recipes planned... grilled cheese, ice cream, brownies, stew, and bread. I was planning on having 5 days of recipes. Well reality struck that it was midterms week and that just wasn't going to happen. I got through some of the recipes (although not in time for St. Paddy's day.. but hey I'm still enjoying that ice cream), but I never ended up making the stew. Meaning I have leftover chicken, guinness, onions, garlic, and carrots. Now most of those ingredients I can incorporate in other meals... but carrots? Well carrots are something I only eat in soups or stews.. until now.  I was trying to think of creative ways to get rid of these carrots beyond the normal soup or carrot cake recipe. That's when I stumbled upon carrot fritters. I was instantly intrigued by the recipe as it's really similar to a potato pancake or zucchini pancake which I have never tried but I always figured I would like those. Plus, I had all of the ingredients in the house with the exception of the green onions, which were easy to pick up on my walk home from class. I devoured these carrot fritters. The recipe makes four so I figured I would be able to eat them as side dishes with my next few meals. I had one right away and then left the other three in the refrigerator and headed off to class. The next three hours of class were agonizing as I thought about carrot fritters. I could not stop thinking about them. Now this is extremely unusual for me to be jonesing for some carrots. Ice cream? yes. But carrots? normally no. But honestly they were just so flavorful and good. The original recipe didn't really incorporate any spices into the recipe but since I'm in love with using the spices in my spice rack I decided to add ground mustard and cumin. I also added some garlic for more flavoring. However, feel free to omit the spices completely or change them up based on what you have! These would be really fantastic as a side dish to your dinner, but I just ate them as a meal in itself. I like to top the fritters with some plain greek yogurt and lemon juice. I honestly can't wait to make these again!

P.S. Just discovered this blog, A Good Appetite, and I absolutely love it. It's written by Kat and Matthew, a couple from Minneapolis (yay Midwest food bloggers!) I've bookmarked a ton of their recipes in addition to this one. So check it out!

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups of carrots, peeled and grated (about 3 large carrots)
4 green onions, sliced
1/4 cup yellow onion, finely diced
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 cup flour
1/2 tsp salt
pinch of pepper
1/2 tsp ground mustard
1/2 tsp cumin
1 egg, beaten

Directions:
Grate carrots using either a box grater or a food processor*. Pour them in a large bowl. Add the green onions, yellow onion, and garlic and give it a good stir. Then add the flour, salt, pepper, ground mustard, cumin and egg. Mix until everything is combined and you will have a thick paste-like mixture. Form the mixture into 4 1/2 inch patties. Set aside for a minute. Just coat the bottom of a non-stick skillet and heat over medium. When hot, place the fritters in the pan. Cook until the bottom is golden brown, about 3 minutes. Flip over, and press the fritters down with the back of a spatula. Cook another 3 minutes or so,  until the bottom is golden brown. Remove from heat and top with greek yogurt. Place any uneaten fritters in a tupperware and refrigerate.

Makes 4 fritters.

*The grater will make the carrots thinner and longer, but I tried that for 2 minutes and got anxious so I just chopped up my carrots in big chunks and threw it in the food processor. You get thicker, shorter pieces but it still tasted delicious and it saved me from orange hands and some time so I'll probably continue doing it this way. If you have a grater blade for your food processor even better!

Source: Recipe adapted from A Good Appetite