As the country gears up for holiday season with songs, sales, and lights, it’s time to hunker down with a fail-proof Thanksgiving menu that everyone can partake of. These Brown Butter Maple-Glazed Baby Carrots with Pecans will delight your guests as you celebrate together.
As you start collecting recipes, this dish contributed to my site from Rachel Fink of Parenting Pod should definitely be considered. . Every dish that evokes fall, family, and home, is on the table. And don’t hesitate to ask your guests to bring side dishes and desserts, either!
Fall
So, what are fall dishes exactly? Recipes made from fall harvest foods, warm spices, and comfort dishes to embrace the magical period between summer and winter.
We’re talking apples, pumpkins, squash, sweet potatoes, beets, carrots, cranberries, and pomegranates—and of course, warming spices like ginger, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, allspice, and turmeric. If you love fall dishes, I bet you would also fall in love with this amazing pumpkin sweet potato soup.
Comfort dishes are defined by Merriam-Webster as “food prepared in a traditional style having a usually nostalgic or sentimental appeal” which is true! But let’s be honest—comfort food is often either creamy, gooey, sticky, sweet, or best served piping hot—or all the above.
Family
Holidays in most households are a time for family—however you choose to define ‘family.’ We often hear crazy holiday stories of dysfunctional family get-togethers from colleagues and friends (or we’re the ones telling them), and we see it all the time in movies like The Family Stone, Home for the Holidays, or the 1986 classic, Hannah and Her Sisters. And, while these families may be petty and dysfunctional, the underlying theme is always the same—family is family no matter what (and they’ll probably repeat these scenes all over again next year, because that’s what family does).
Family get-togethers often include people of all ages and generations—which means it must include a variety of foods as well, from kid-friendly to grandparent-friendly and everything in between.
Old, young, biological—or not—Thanksgiving dinner participants gather to share smiles, laughs, and smirks, and most importantly—food.
Home
Not to get all “cliché,” but home is where the heart is. Now—what does that mean, exactly? Something different for each person.
For some, home could be the feeling they get when they talk to their mother on the phone. For others, it could be the checkers on a picnic blanket, the smell of old furniture, or the sizzle of frying onions. Twinkling lights or a warm, cozy blanket—each person experiences home a little differently.
One of the best ways to evoke the feeling of home is through cooking. The smells, sights, and tastes involved in one simple dish can bring a person back to his mother’s kitchen 50 years ago.
Bring that to Thanksgiving. Incorporate a favorite childhood dish into your Thanksgiving dinner this year. Create those memories with your children, and savor every bite. You can also take the time to create a fabulous kids’ table like this one.
Brown Butter Maple-Glazed Baby Carrots with Pecans
This dish from Parenting Pod is the ultimate Thanksgiving side. It’s all the things. We’re talking the whole “fall, family, and home” package.
Carrots are a fall harvest food—and these ones are cooked in warming garlic and a sweet and sticky glaze (bring on the comfort food!). It pleases people of all ages. The kids will love them because they’re oh-so-sweet, and the grandparents will love them because—well—cooked carrots.
These carrots are a perfect mix of sweet and savory to fill your house with the smell of home.
(Oh, and they’re nutritious too! We’re talking lots of fiber, vitamin A, vitamin K, folate, potassium, and manganese. Shhh, don’t tell the kids.)
Ingredients
- 1 lb baby carrots
- 4 tbsp unsalted butter
- 4 cloves garlic, crushed
- 1 tbsp maple syrup
- 1 tbsp honey
- Pinch of salt
- 1 cup pecan pieces
- 1 tsp chopped fresh thyme
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
- Put the butter in an oven-safe skillet over medium heat until it starts to brown. Add the garlic, stir for 30 seconds, and then add the carrots. Stir to coat the carrots in the butter, then add the maple syrup, honey, salt, and pecans, and mix all together until the carrots and pecans are fully coated. Turn off the flame and stir in the thyme.
- Transfer the skillet to the oven and roast for 15 minutes or until the carrots become tender. Serve hot.
Attending Thanksgiving dinner this year as a guest? Offer to bring dish to relieve your host from the headache of delegating or from just doing it all. These Brown Butter Maple-Glazed Baby Carrots with Pecans are bound to be a crown-pleaser, so double or triple the recipe for a larger group.
Thanks to my Guest Writer
Rachel Fink is a blogger at Parenting Pod and a mom of 7 kids. Her best tip for raising a large family while keeping your sanity is to keep around a large stash of coffee, chocolate, and wine.
Brown Butter Maple-Glazed Baby Carrots with Pecans
Ingredients
- 1 lb baby carrots
- 4 tbsp unsalted butter
- 4 cloves garlic crushed
- 1 tbsp maple syrup
- 1 tbsp honey
- Pinch of salt
- 1 cup pecan pieces
- 1 tsp chopped fresh thyme
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
- Put the butter in an oven-safe skillet over medium heat until it starts to brown. Add the garlic, stir for 30 seconds, and then add the carrots. Stir to coat the carrots in the butter, then add the maple syrup, honey, salt, and pecans, and mix all together until the carrots and pecans are fully coated. Turn off the flame and stir in the thyme.
- Transfer the skillet to the oven and roast for 15 minutes or until the carrots become tender. Serve hot.
We have found that butter, maple, and pecans go well with carrots or sweet potatoes. This is a great healthy combination. We are always looking for new recipes for pecans and this one is a nice choice! Thank you for sharing.
Yay! Thanks so much. I’m so glad you like this recipe.