Thai Peanut Carrot Noodles
Looking for an easy, healthy side dish? These Thai Peanut Carrot Noodles are packed with flavor, and they take only a few minutes to make!
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Have you ever made a sauce or dressing that’s so darned tasty that you start looking for other ways to use it? That’s me with these Thai Peanut Carrot Noodles. The Thai peanut sauce comes from these Thai Peanut Wraps. (On a side note, those wraps are one of the most popular recipes on my blog!)
We love that sauce so much that we’ve started making double batches of it. Like most sauces, this one tastes even better after it sits in the fridge overnight. The ingredients meld together into a wonderful combination of flavors that make you want to eat the sauce straight out of the jar. Not like I’ve ever done that or anything….
Now that the holidays are behind us, we’ve buckled down and turned our attention back to healthier eating. Truthfully, we don’t really change our eating habits much around here. Instead, we just change the portion sizes when the scale starts to climb a little too high. However, changing portion sizes can mean your dinner plate can look a little underwhelming. That’s where we supplement with lots of veggies. Those vegetables fill out the plate at a very cheap price in terms of overall calories.
Carrots have been one of my favorites lately, and I’ve been buying bags of baby carrots to eat at lunch instead of chips. Sure, salty chips taste better, but the carrots bring the same crunch at just a fraction of the calories. I don’t know about you, but I still need my plate to look full at meals. If it looks small, my brain will tell me I’m not full…and that leads to mid-afternoon raids on the pantry.
Thai Peanut Carrot Noodles
Thai Peanut Carrot NoodlesEnter these Thai Peanut Carrot Noodles. We happened to have a little bit of that Thai peanut sauce leftover recently, and I dipped one of my carrots into it. Dee-licious! That’s when it hit me that I could shred the carrots and turn the whole thing into a tasty (and easy) side dish. Now I did use a veggie spiralizer to make these ‘noodles,’ but I found it to be a bit of a pain. Next time I make this recipe, I’ll probably just use a vegetable peeler. Same results in about half the time!
In addition to the carrots, I added some thinly sliced red bell pepper and edamame to this recipe. I essentially used the exact same recipe as those Thai Peanut Wraps, just without the wraps and with carrots in place of cabbage. These ‘noodles’ were a huge hit here in our house, and we ate these as a side dish for several nights. Talk about a delicious (and colorful!) addition to the dinner plate!
If you’re looking to add some new veggie side dishes to your recipe collection, then put this one on the list! It’s a quick and easy dish that’s packed with fresh flavors. I hope you enjoy this one as much as we do. Cheers!
Did you make these Thai Peanut Carrot Noodles at home? Leave a comment. Or snap a photo and tag me on Instagram (@Spicedblog)!
Thai Peanut Carrot Noodles
Ingredients
For the Salad
- 5 large carrots
- 1 red bell pepper thinly sliced
- 1 cup edamame cooked and shelled
- ¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro
- ½ cup chopped green onions
For the Peanut Sauce
- 2 Tbsp rice vinegar
- 1 Tbsp soy sauce
- 1 Tbsp lime juice
- 1 Tbsp honey
- 1 tsp garlic minced
- ¼ cup creamy peanut butter
- ½ tsp salt
- ¼ tsp crushed red pepper flakes
Instructions
For the Salad
- Using a vegetable peeler, shave carrots into long, thin ribbons. Place carrots in a large bowl.
- Add sliced bell pepper, edamame, cilantro and green onions; toss until well combined. Set bowl aside.
For the Peanut Sauce
- Using a small mixing bowl, add rice vinegar, soy sauce, lime juice, honey and garlic; whisk until well combined.
- Add the peanut butter, salt and red pepper flakes; whisk until smooth.
- Pour peanut sauce into bowl with carrots; toss until well combined.
Looking for other tasty veggie side dish recipes? Check out these other favorites, too:
Love dishes that are both healthy *and* tasty. This certainly looks like one of them. And beautiful to look at as well.
The holidays for us aren’t quite over yet, we still have “La Befana” coming up this weekend (look out for my next post for details) but next week begins the “lean” post holiday period. I’ll definitely be needing to slimming down a bit this year, lol!
I’m with ya, Frank. I find that healthier foods are often overly bland…but there are totally ways to find flavor but still keep it healthier. These carrot noodles fit the bill!
So I wasn’t familiar with La Befana until you mentioned it here. Fun! I’ll be popping over shortly to read more about it in your next post. 🙂 Happy New Year, my friend!
Love the look of this, David. Thai flavours are some of my favourite, and I love using veggies as noodles! Great, colourful dish.
Thanks so much, Alexandra! This dish is packed with flavor, and it’s super colorful, too. You know what they say about eating the rainbow? Well you can knock out a bunch of the colors here! 🙂 Happy New Year, my friend!
Wow! Those colors! Those flavors!!! I love your Thai peanut wraps so I can’t wait to try this salad with that lovely dressing. This is a great recipe to eat healthier without feeling deprived!
If you love those Thai peanut wraps, then you’ll find these carrots quite tasty, too! After all, it’s just a simple twist on that classic recipe. 🙂 And, yes, I love those recipes that are healthy, but still pack a strong punch in the flavor department. Happy New Year, my friend!
I think everyone’s scales climb a bit too high at the end of last month! Good idea about the salad, it the zing and savoury dressing sound like it would go well with the carrots.
Yeah, I hear ya on the scales, Matt. I think that’s part of what makes the holidays so much fun, though! 🙂 Now it’s time to settle back into a healthier routine. These carrot “noodles” totally fit that bill…but they don’t sacrifice anything in the flavor department. Cheers, my friend!
I have to disagree with you, David, and say that carrots do taste as good as chips. So what explains that I go running to the cupboard for chips instead of to the fridge for carrots, only my therapist can tell. But dip those carrots in a tasty sauce, and I will easily skip the chips. Wake up in the middle of the night and can’t get back to sleep, and I’ll just eat the sauce with a spoon. Or maybe I won’t, and no one can actually prove what happened to all that sauce. All that aside, this looks like a fantastic veggie-oriented dish that I’ve love to try.
‘Tis true, Jeff. If you eat all of the sauce in the middle of the night, there are (probably) no witnesses to the crime…so therefore it never happened, right? We can blame the ghost…or the dog…or a robber. (Yeah, the robber who broke in to steal your Thai Peanut Sauce. Haha!) Either way, this is a tasty dish. Give it a shot. Better yet, pour that sauce on chips and call it a day. 🙂
I love anything with Peanut sauce! And carrots are a great idea! I’m with you on the full plate business, because it’s true, we all eat with our eyes first. And a full plate tells us we will be satisfied with what’s on it! A nice recipe, David! Thanks and Happy New Year!
It’s so strange how the eyes play tricks on you when it comes to the full plate thing. I mean eat a whole plate of roasted broccoli and be happier than just one bite of mac and cheese…well…maybe. I do love mac and cheese! Hah!
This is a great bowl of fresh tasting veggie noodles. I can see why it would go so well with your peanut sauce. Great for a healthy start to the New Year. Here’s to a great 2020 with some great tasting food, exactly like this David!
Yes! Cheers to 2020 and a bunch of new delicious recipes. 🙂 Thanks, Neil!
David, when my scale goes up I don’t change portion size, I just buy larger jeans.
I love carrot crunch salads so this sounds so good. But, alas we’re nut-free in our house. What do you think about using tahini instead of peanut butter?
Haha! Now I like the way you think, Ron. However, there’s only so many times you can pull that trick! 🙂 So I think tahini would be a great twist here. It would certainly be delicious, and the flavors would still work. I say give it a shot for sure! And now I’m craving tahini…
I’m ALL over this! I looooove carrots and, while I haven’t tried your peanut sauce yet, I love it already. The addition of bell peppers and edamame just takes this over the top–trying this asap!
Definitely put this one on the menu, Kelsie! It’s delicious. And it’s colorful, too…you know what they say about eating the rainbow!
That is a nice looking side and a change from the cucumber salad I usually serve with Thai food.
Yes! This would indeed be a fun way to mix up that cucumber salad. Actually, now that you mention it, Karen, I bet you could do this salad with 1/2 carrots and 1/2 cucumber. The flavors would work!
What a delicious and pretty recipe, David. If (and that’s a big if), there’s leftover sauce, all I need is a straw. 😉 ~Valentina
Tell me about it, Valentina! Usually when I make a batch of those wraps, I’ll inevitably need to make another round of sauce about halfway through. It’s so good! The carrots were a fun twist this time…and healthy, too! 🙂
Carrots are one of my favorite vegetables. I love the ingredients of this dish. I think that it would be a hit with my family!
Awesome! I do enjoy carrots, too, Dawn, but we often just eat them plain. I have to say that shredding ’em and mixing in the Thai Peanut Sauce was a delicious side dish!
Oh yes, I also loveeee peanut sauce! So damn tasty. Adore the idea opf combining peanut sauce with shredded carrots for a healthy but flavorful side.
Peanut sauce is magical! We really loved this side dish, too. It was packed with flavor, but without the calories…perfect for this post-holiday slim down time. Thanks so much, Nicole!
YUM!!!!! This looks fabulous! I totally know what you mean about those sauces that are just so good, you’ve got to find more ways to enjoy them. You’ve created such an amazing combo here with the sauce and those beautiful carrots, I can almost taste it as I write! I need to check out your Thai Peanut Wraps recipe, sounds equally amazing!
Sauces can turn anything from just ok to amazing! While I do love carrots, I admit they aren’t the most exciting thing to eat. However, stir in some of this peanut sauce and you’ve got a delicious side dish. Easy, too! Thanks so much, Shannon!
This is just the kind of thing that I need to be eating right now. The holidays really did a number on my waistline… !
You and me both, Frank! We splurged a bit during the holidays, but we’re back on track now. We’re doing the whole calorie counting thing, and it’s working well. Dishes like this help a lot! Tons of flavor without hitting the overall calorie counter too much. 🙂