I almost feel like this is one of those dishes that I should go back and do one of my vegetable explorations of, but then I’d have to come up with like three other carrot-centric recipes. And this one took some work all on its own – it’s been “in process” for almost a year. Some of that is simply the availability of… let’s call them… alternate carrots.

Like these, organic purple carrots. I also found organic yellow carrots. And even organic little baby orange carrots with lovely carrot frond tops. All the verdulerias here cut the tops off of pretty much all root vegetables, and they rarely have organics – it’s really annoying all the waste of things like carrot tops, beet tops, etc. And you try to explain it to them and they look at you in disbelief, like no one would ever eat those things.

So, I don’t remember where the idea came from – I’m sure it had its genesis in some of the other savory, vegetable cheesecakes we’ve made over the years – tomato, mushroom, artichoke have been among the favorites. At some point I started putting together a Textures of Carrot idea, and playing with it bit by bit. It finally all came together when I was able to get the different types of carrots that I really wanted to make this work.

Elements:

• Crust is a mix of polenta, pastry flour, butter, gran pampeano cheese (more or less the Argentine version of grana padano), par-baked.
• Topped with – cheesecake mixture of cream cheese, pureed cooked baby carrots, egg, pastry flour, chipotle chili powder, salt, brown sugar – then baked until set.
• Tuile of sardo cheese (more or less pecorino) with chili flakes.
• Puree of the blanched and shocked carrot tops from the baby carrots, pureed with neutral oil, water, salt, and a little xanthan gum to emulsify it.
• Pale yellow carrots, split down the middle and roasted with olive oil, salt, and pepper, until just at a sort of soft, chewy, with little crispy bits stage.
• Purple carrots, chopped, and sweated until soft in a mix of Hierro-Quina Perreti liqueur (a local amaro), cream, honey, and salt
• Dusting of carrot top powder (dehydrated some of the carrot tops and then ground them in a spice grinder.

Very happy with the results, and lots of compliments all around! I really like savory cheesecakes, have to come up with more of them – they’re almost always a hit.