Christmas is a time for celebration and tradition. Every family has their own traditions, passed down through the generations. Some of them, like Grandma’s carrots, are so intrinsically linked to Christmas dinner it would be unthinkable not to serve them. That is until, someone forgets the recipe!

I didn’t even know it was a real recipe until a few years ago. Grandma always added a knob of butter in all her vegetables after straining, before serving. At Christmas she would add a little sugar to the carrots too. They were delicious. She called them candied carrots. As the years have gone by the amount of sugar has been reduced, I have done them successfully with sweetener too. Turns out these are Vichy carrots. A method of cooking carrots from the town of Vichy in France. Their taste attributed to the local mineral water. They are just as delicious when cooked in local tap water though.

How our hostess forgot, or maybe the question should be why she thought, she’d forgotten, no one knows, but as we were starting our dinner she asked if we liked them, saying she had forgotten the recipe, so had googled a recipe for boiled carrots! Well, that was it really, there was a moment of silence before the laughter began and her partner could be heard saying you googled a recipe for boiled carrots??? It took a while for the room to calm down before she then shared the recipe she’d found. Honey, water, butter and herbs…..turns out it’s all about the herbs. Grandma didn’t add herbs. Of course it didn’t end there….she has suffered relentless, good humoured teasing over googling how to boil carrots over the following days. Meaning Christmas 2022 will always be remembered as the one which established once and for all, the ABC boiled carrot recipe.

Happy New Year Everybody

Love M. XXX