Perfectly Cooked Sous Vide Carrots - Crave The Good (2024)

Sous vide carrots just turn up the flavour. They have incredible tender texture while retaining a little bit of bite. These sous vide carrots are cooked in their own juice with a brown sugar and butter glaze.

Due to current world events, I’ve been cramming as many fruits and vegetables into my kids as humanly possible.

They are getting tired of the same old, so it’s time to get creative!

Both of my kids absolutely love these sous vide carrots so much that there are often hardly any left for Kevy and me! It’s a good problem to have.

This sous vide carrots recipe is dedicated to beating the same old.

💡 Tips + Tricks

No. 1 –> 1 lb of carrots is roughly 5 or 6 carrots that are approximately 6″ long and 1″ or less in diameter. If you want to add more to this recipe, the number of carrots won’t make too much a difference in the final product!

No. 2 –> Yes, you can serve these carrots straight out of the water bath with a drizzle of their cooking liquid, BUT rendering the cooking liquid and caramelizing the brown sugar adds so much to the dish.

No. 3 –> These carrots can be cooked at a higher temperature as well. If you’re wanting to have sous vide carrots and sous vide mashed potatoes at dinner, simply reduce the cooking time to 15-25 minutes and cook them in the 194f water bath with the potatoes.

🗝 Key ingredients

Carrots: Use fresh carrots whenever possible, and try to keep the carrots as uniform in size as possible.

Brown sugar: Brown sugar has molasses in it which adds a richer, more caramel flavour to it, which pairs great with the carrots. That said, feel free to use regular granulated sugar, just cut down the amount slightly.

Butter: Buttered carrots, I don’t think I need to say more there. The butter melts and mingles with the brown sugar for a simple glaze that is oh so yummy!

How to make sous vide carrots

1. Prepare your sous vide water bath to 185f. I like to use the hottest water I can get out of my tap for hotter cooks as it reduces the preheat time!
2. Wash and peel your carrots. Choose uniform-sized carrots if possible. Cut out any soft spots or damaged parts.
3. Place the carrots into your vacuum bag (or see below for options if you don’t have a vacuum sealer) then add butter and brown sugar to the bag before sealing.
4. Once the water bath reaches temperature, place the bag into the water bath. I like to clip mine to the edge of my Cambro container with little binder clips.
5. Sous vide the carrots at 185 for 45-60 minutes depending on the size of your carrots. Check them for doneness at around 45 minutes.
6. When the carrots are done, cut open the bag and dump the cooking liquid into a preheated heavy-bottomed skillet.
7. Cook the butter brown sugar liquid over medium heat until it simmers for around 3 minutes and thickens like caramel.
8. Add the carrots to the skillet and toss them in the caramel to coat before transferring to a serving dish and sprinkling with finishing salt.

Are they ready?

To test the carrots, I like to unclip the bag from the Cambro and using tongs, remove the bag from the water bath. From there I give them a quick squeeze and a bend test. If they bend easily and feel tender, they’re ready – if not, back in they go!

No vacuum sealer? No problem

You can easily sous vide this recipe without a vacuum sealer. I personally prefer to use a vacuum sealer on hight temp or long term cooks, because my fail-rate is much lower, however, if you don’t have one, we can make it work with ziplock style bags or reusable silicone bags.

Ziplock bags: To cook carrots in ziplock style bags, use heavy-duty freezer bags. Because we cannot get all the air out of these bags, I recommend adding a heavy butter knife or spoon to the bag as a weight. Once the carrots, butter, and sugar have been added to the bag, slowly lower the open bag into the water, allowing the water pressure to squeeze out the air. Close the bag once you’ve removed as much air as possible. Then repeat the process with a second bag.

Silicone bags: To cook carrots in reusable silicone bags, lay them into a single layer in the bag, add the butter, and sugar, then manually remove as much air as possible then close the bag. This is easy to do with carrots because you don’t have to worry about damaging them.

Make ahead?

These carrots can definitely be made ahead! Follow the preparation steps above until you remove the carrots from the water bath. At that point, drop the sous vide bag into a sink of cold water to cool the carrots. Once the carrots are cooled place them in the fridge for up to 7 days.

To reheat, either reheat in the sous vide bag in a sous vide water bath, or toss the carrots and their cooking liquid into a large heavy bottomed skillet and heat over medium low until heated through – usually about 10 or so minutes.

🤍 More sous vide recipes to love!

Recommended equipment

Sous vide circulator: I have and love the Instant Pot Accu Slim sous vide. I chose to purchase a cheaper sous vide a couple of years ago when I wasn’t sure if I’d love it. Turns out I really like it! This little unit runs probably once a week in our house!

Cambro container: When I started sous viding (that’s a word, I think) I used whatever I had that would fit what I was cooking, a big pot, the liner to my Instant Pot, a 3 gallon fermentation crock, but I much prefer my Cambro container. It’s light and easy to handle, and I’m able to store my sous vide inside of it when it’s not in use.

Vacuum sealer: Sous vide really does mean under vacuum, trust me, I’m French! The benefit to using a vacuum sealer and likewise, vacuum bags, is that you’ll run into fewer complications when cooking. I’ve found, that especially for high temperature or long cooks, vacuum-sealed bags are less likely to leak.

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