Roasted Carrots with Chickpeas, Dates and Feta

I used black chickpeas for this because I had a package lurking in the cupboard and I thought the contrasting color to the carrots would be pretty, but feel free to simply open a can of regular chickpeas and use them rather than rehydrating and cooking dried beans from scratch.

2 carrots, peeled and cut into bite-sized batons

1 shallot, peeled and finely julienned

1 cup chickpeas

4 dates, roughly chopped

1/3 c crumbled Feta cheese

1 Tbsp chopped mint

1 Tbsp olive oil

Juice and zest from one lemon

1/4 tsp cumin

Salt to taste

Preheat the oven to 450.

Place the carrots in one layer on a foil or parchment paper lined baking tray.

Drizzle with the olive oil, some salt, and half the lemon zest. Toss to coat the carrot pieces and then bake until tender. This took about 15 minutes for me, but will depend very much on the size of your carrot batons.

After ten minutes of cooking, add the cumin, chickpeas and shallots to the baking tray. Toss to combine and cook for the remainder of the time needed to get the carrots as tender as you like them.

Remove to the top of your stove and toss in the lemon juice and remaining zest.

Spoon onto a plate and top with the Feta and mint.

I ate this with warm yogurt flatbreads and spooned the salad up onto hunks of it.