Moroccan Orange and Carrot Salad

We're all in the same boat on this quarantine thing, we're all stuck at home as much as possible. For me the thing I miss the most is adventure, looking for something new and exciting to do. One way I have tried to appease that, is for me not a new way at all, but an old and neglected hobby in the form of cooking. I mean I blog, I have to love cooking, but life had been getting in the way and now it seems I have endless amounts of it. So with lot of newfound time and whatever I can find at the grocery store, I have been cooking.

Thankfully my pantry and spice cabinet have a lot of leftover gems from trying things here and there to keep experimenting with. So one night I was using the last jar of preserved lemons and harissa paste for Chicken Tajine Mchermel (chicken with preserved lemons) for dinner and looking for Moroccan food bloggers for more ideas to serve with it when I came across this recipe from Taste of Moroc. And since right now I like recipes with every day ingredients I knew I had to try it.

My family loved this recipe with dinner. At first I wasn't sure the carrots added a while lot, but the more I ate the more I found myself enjoying the texture they added. I also swapped the cinnamon in the original recipe for allspice. I did this for two reasons, first I couldn't find the cinnamon in the cabinet and kept shuffling the allspice out of the way to look and secondly I love allspice, it's my favorite of the sweet spices. I also recommend taking a pinch of the carrots after they have sat with the sugar for a few minutes and tasting them. Unexpected and delicious.

2 medium carrots
4 cara cara oranges
1 tsp. sugar
pinch salt
1 tsp. orange blossom water
1/4 c. orange juice
1/4 tsp. allspice

Grate the carrot an season with the sugar and salt. Set aside while you segment the orange.

Peel and segment the oranges over the carrots. Add the oranges, orange juice orange blossom water, and allspice. 

Let chill for at least 30 minutes before serving.