How to Make Carrot Flowers

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Carrot flowers are useful for adding to drinks, stir-fry dishes and salads. Unlike some garnishes, they're actually a pretty decoration that's also tasty to eat. Best of all, there are a variety of ways to make them so you don't need to be an expert fruit and vegetable carver to make them yourself. Whether you want to use a knife, cookie cutters, a zester, or peeler, you can create attractive carrot flowers in no time.

Method 1
Method 1 of 5:

Cutting Simple Carrot Flowers with a Knife

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  1. Take a medium or large carrot, and use a vegetable peeler to remove the skin. After peeling the carrot, use a sharp knife to cut it in half, thirds, or quarters, depending on the size of the carrot. The pieces should be approximately 3-inches (8-cm) long. [1]
    • You don’t necessarily have to peel the carrots. If you’re using organic carrots, the skin is usually thin enough to eat.
  2. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    Take each section of carrot, and use a knife that you feel comfortable making precise slices with to cut long, shallow wedges along the entire length the carrot piece to form the flowers’ petals. You’ll want to make 5 to 6 wedges around each piece of carrot. [2]
    • It helps to hold the carrot piece upright when you’re cutting out the wedges. Balance it against a cutting board with one hand, and use the other to cut.
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  3. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    Once you’ve cut out wedges around the entire piece of carrot, place it horizontally on the cutting board, and use your knife to slice it into coins that are approximately ¼-inch (½-cm) thick. Each coin will be a small flower. [3]
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Method 2
Method 2 of 5:

Cutting Delicate Carrot Flowers with a Knife

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  1. Cut the top and the bottom off the carrot.
  2. You want a nice, wide base for your flower. Shape one side into a half circle or dome.
  3. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    You're aiming for five petal shapes around the outside, which will be attached at the base of the carrot. Use the knife to mark from one point to another (with a curved petal shape, pointing upward).
  4. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    Don't go all the way down; leave the bottom attached.
  5. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    Be careful not to gouge out too much, but you want your petals to be a nice, thin layer.
    • Every time that you finish a layer, make sure that each petal is curved, and doesn't have any sharp edges on it.
    • Repeat those step until you get about 4-6 layers.
    • Cut that part, and make it shorter than the other layers.
  8. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
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Method 3
Method 3 of 5:

Using Cookie Cutters to Make Carrot Flowers

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  1. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    Take a medium or large carrot and use a vegetable peeler to remove the skin. Next, take a sharp knife and carefully slice the carrot into coins. Make sure that they coins are ¼-inch (½-cm) thick or less, or you may have trouble cutting the flowers.
    • If you have a mandoline, you may find it easier to cut the carrot into coins with it.
  2. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    Find a small round cookie cutter that’s smaller in circumference than the carrot coins. Press it into the center of the carrot coin to create a perfectly round circle.
    • If you don’t have a round cookie cutter that’s small enough to fit inside the coins that you’ve cut, you can use a small plastic cap from a bottle or other household item to cut out perfectly round coins.
    • While the round cookie cutter will give a symmetrical circle, you don’t necessarily have to use it. If you’re comfortable with the finished carrot flowers being slightly irregular, you can skip this step.
  3. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    When you’ve used the round cookie cutter on all of your carrot coins, use the edge of a diamond-shaped cookie cutter to cut out small “V” shapes around the entire edge of the coins. That will form the petals for the flowers.
    • If you don’t have a diamond-shaped cookie cutter, you can cut out the “V” shapes using a sharp knife.
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Method 4
Method 4 of 5:

Making Simple Carrot Flowers with a Zester

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  1. Take a medium size carrot, and remove the skin using a vegetable peeler. With a sharp knife, trim off the ends of the carrot to get the thickness as close to uniform along the entire length as you can.
  2. Instead of using a knife to cut out notches, drag a citrus zester along the entire length of the carrot. The notches won’t be as deep as they would be with a knife, so the flowers will have a delicate, frilly look when they’re finished. [4]
    • For this method, you can’t use a grater or microplane style zester. You need a traditional zester that features a series of sharp holes at the end of a handle.
  3. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    After you’ve run the zester along the entire length of the carrot, use a sharp knife to slice it into coins. You can make the coins as thick or thin as you like, and each will have the notches to create the subtle flower shape. [5]
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Method 5
Method 5 of 5:

Creating Carrot Flowers with a Vegetable Sharpener/Peeler

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  1. Take a medium size carrot, and use a vegetable peeler or knife to remove the skin. It’s important to remove all of the skin so that when you run the carrot through the sharpener, you’re only shaving off the flesh and not any of the skin.
  2. Watermark wikiHow to Make Carrot Flowers
    Do this until you have enough flesh to form a flower. Use a vegetable peeler that resembles a pencil sharpener and insert the carrot. Turn it to shave off the outer layers of flesh in one continuous strip. Shave the carrot until you have enough shavings to create the size of flower that you want.
    • You can use a traditional vegetable peeler or even a knife to shave off the carrot flesh too. However, it’s more difficult to keep the shavings in a continuous strip with one of those tools, so work slowly and carefully.
  3. When you’ve shaved enough flesh from the carrot, carefully take the shavings off the sharpener, going slow to avoid tearing them. Using your fingers, curl the shavings into a flower shape by wrapping them around themselves.
    • Because of the way the peeler shaves the vegetables, the carrot flesh will naturally curl in on itself, so follow the natural curve to make shaping the flower easier.
  4. After you’ve shaped the carrot shavings into a flower, take a toothpick and push it through the bottom where the ends of the savings overlap. That will help the flower keep its shape, so you can place it on a plate as a garnish without worrying about it coming undone.
    • The toothpick should be able to pierce the shaved carrot flesh on its own, but if it doesn’t go through easily, use a knife to create a small hole that you can push the toothpick through.
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      Tips

      • Carrot flowers make ideal garnishes for salads and fun additions to crudite platters, but you can also add them to recipes in place of sliced carrots. For example, dress up a soup by floating carrot flowers in it instead of plain carrot slices.
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      Things You'll Need

      Knife Carrot Flowers

      • A medium or large carrot
      • A vegetable peeler
      • A sharp knife

      Cookie Cutter Carrot Flowers

      • A medium or large carrot
      • A sharp knife
      • A small round cookie cutter
      • A diamond-shaped cookie cutter

      Zester Carrot Flowers

      • A medium carrot
      • A vegetable peeler
      • A citrus zester
      • A sharp knife

      Vegetable Sharpener Carrot Flowers

      • A vegetable peeler
      • A sharp knife
      • A vegetable sharpener
      • A toothpick

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      References

      1. ↑ https://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-cut-carrots-into-flowers-69679
      2. ↑ https://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-cut-carrots-into-flowers-69679
      3. ↑ https://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-cut-carrots-into-flowers-69679
      4. ↑ https://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-cut-carrots-into-flowers-69679
      5. ↑ https://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-cut-carrots-into-flowers-69679

      About This Article

      Article Summary X

      To make carrot flowers, start by peeling a large carrot and cutting it into 3-inch pieces. Next, use a knife to cut 6 shallow, vertical wedges around the circumference of the carrot. Then, lay the piece of carrot down horizontally on a cutting board and slice it into 1/4 inch thick pieces so that each piece looks like a flower. Alternatively, use a vegetable peeler to shave strips from a carrot, then curl the strips around themselves to create a rose-like shape. Finally, push a toothpick through the bottom to help the flower keep its shape. To learn how to create carrot flowers using cookie cutters, read on!

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