Shaved Rainbow Carrot & Sweet Potato Salad with Cilantro, Cumin Vinaigrette & Queso Fresco

So, in my Backyard Produce Mystery Box delivery I received rainbow carrots. They made me ridiculously happy. And instead of just cooking them to smithereens or slicing them up in a salad, I wanted to make them the stars of the show.

Obviously, you can use regular carrots for this salad.

Aren’t they beautiful?

I started peeling (butchering) them with my cheap peeler and ended up literally throwing the peeler across the kitchen, driving to Target and buying this guy. Wow, I never realized how much I appreciated a good peeler till now. I recommend grabbing a Y-shaped peeler if you’re going for beautiful, smooth peels.

Peel the carrots until you can peel them no longer.  You may end up having to eat the little bits that can’t be peeled.

Curl them with your fingers and carefully place them on a plate. Or just toss them on it.

Did you know that raw sweet potato is actually pretty good? Peel off the outer skin then peel your desired amount of potato and add to the carrots.

For a simple vinaigrette, add a plop of dijon mustard, a clove or two of raw crushed garlic, cumin, salt and pepper.

Slowly whisk in about 1 part red wine vinegar and 2 parts olive oil. Taste before you serve.

Pick a few nice leaves off of the cilantro.

Decorate the plate.

Drizzle the desired amount of cumin vinaigrette over the veggies.

Now add a bit of queso fresco or feta on top if you’d like, or leave the cheese out all together. Queso fresco, in a nutshell, is a Latin cheese with the flavor similar to mozzarella and the texture of feta.