Make Carrots the Most Exciting Side on the Thanksgiving Table!

Officially, this recipe is called Butter-Roasted Carrots with Za’atar and Pomegranate Molasses, but we kick off the roasting with olive oil. Carrots take longer to cook than butter takes to brown. Using butter as the first and only cooking fat would cause the milk solids to burn. Adding it a little later ensures those solids only caramelize, giving the dish a rich, nutty fragrance and flavor.

Adding the spice blend a little later helps protect its flavor too. Much like the milk solids, the oregano and thyme in the za’atar will burn if added too early. This two-step approach ensures you get the best possible outcome: super-sweet, meltingly tender, well seasoned carrots glazed with browned, not acrid, butter.

But, these carrots aren’t just sweet and nutty; they’re sweet, nutty, earthy, salty, tangy, slightly bitter and rich. Instead of salt and pepper, they're seasoned with za’atar, a Middle Eastern spice blend made up of sesame seeds, sumac, salt, thyme and oregano. It’s the sumac that makes za’atar stand out amongst other blends—with its noticeable tang, it can work as a stand-in for lemon juice or vinegar.

For even more complexity, orange is incorporated in two ways. The zest gets tossed with the carrots along with the za’atar and butter, while the flesh gets roasted alongside the vegetable. After cooking, the juice from the caramelized fruit is used to deglaze the sheet pan—make sure to scrape up all the little browned bits—creating a buttery glaze with deep, juicy flavor.

It’s all finished with crunchy chopped pistachios and pomegranate molasses, a mouthwateringly tart and juicy mainstay of Turkish cuisine, made by boiling down fresh pomegranate juice into a thick, garnet-hued syrup. The final result is a dish of carrots that puts green bean casserole to shame—decadent and rich enough to feel special, with a bracing acidity that cuts through the heaviness of traditional Thanksgiving fare. In short: the perfect side dish.