Gochugaru, which is coarse Korean red pepper powder has been a staple ingredient in my kitchen for quite a while now and I'll admit, I will try to add it to as many dishes as possible.
I usually make these roasted carrots before a BBQ since they're a nice spicy addition to the usual meats and/or vegetables, or for a Sunday Roast, but they can be made whenever you desire.
This one is quite a simple and easy-to-make recipe, it takes only a few minutes to prep and about 20 minutes to make. If you're trying to spice up your usual recipe for roasted carrots, then you should definitely give this one a try.
You will need:
3 medium carrots (400g peeled carrots)
1 teaspoon coarse Korean pepper powder (Gochugaru)
2 teaspoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon of sea salt
1 heaped teaspoon demerara sugar
How to:
Trim and peel the carrots, then slice them into medium-sized strips (about 7 cm long and half a cm thin) and place them into a mixing bowl
Add all seasoning and mix well.
Place on a tray lined with baking parchment and spread the seasoned carrots evenly
Roast the carrots for 15-20 minutes at 180C/gas 4 in the preheated oven, turning them over after about 10 min.
Ideally, they should still be crunchy so if you end up leaving them for longer in the oven they might become a bit too mushy (for my taste at least).
Substitutions:
Feel free to use rainbow carrots if you have them, I normally use the orange ones because they're more easily available.
You can use honey instead of demerara sugar but it will make the carrots a bit stickier
You can use vegetable or sunflower oil instead of olive oil if need be (for more flavourful carrots I would recommend using olive oil)
You can use Himalayan salt instead of sea salt, or table salt if none of the previous is an option
Unfortunately, I can't recommend any alternative to the Korean pepper powder since it has quite a unique taste, but luckily nowadays you can find it in some large supermarkets or online on various websites (in the UK at least).
If you try this recipe, please let me know how it went in the comments below.
I hope life is treating you well.
Take care.