One of the most important skills in the kitchen is how to use a knife. Each week, we introduce the skills necessary to accomplish 1 task in a cleaner, more efficient way. Today we focus on knife skills to cut carrot sticks.
Many terms in cooking come from French. Perhaps you’ve heard (or even used) the word “julienne“. To julienne simply means cutting a vegetable or meat into matchsticks, which is exactly what we’re focusing on today.
Perfect isn’t a realistic goal, but when it comes to knife skills, consistency is key. It’s important to aim for your pieces to all be, roughly, the same size and shape. More than just appearances, the size and shape to affect cooking time. So here are the steps to cutting uniform carrot sticks.
As always, start with a clean cutting board, knife and side towel. We’ll also use a Y-peeler, so have one of those handy as well.
Let’s go!
Step by Step Instructions on How to Cut Carrot Sticks
Step 1: Slice off the top and bottom of the carrot.
Step 2: Peel the entire carrot from top to bottom. We recommend the Y-peeler because it’s so fast.
Step 3: Lay the carrot down horizontally and slice it into 3 equal chunks.
Step 4: Working with 1 chunk at a time, slice into 3 even strips (the long way). To do this, lay the carrot down and make a slice about 1/3 of the way it. Then cut the remainder of the carrot in half, so you end up with 3 strips that are roughly the same size.
Step 5: Stack 2 of the strips and carefully slice again into 3 even strips. This step is a key time saver! You made only 2 cuts and ended up with 6 carrot sticks. Amazing!
Step 6: Lay the remaining strip on the flat side and slice into thirds. This is really important for safety. We always want to cut on a “flat” side, but carrots are round. So instead of trying out some crazy balancing technique, slice your third chunk separately.
Step 7: Repeat with the other “chunks.”
As the carrot gets narrow toward the end, you may find that you need only 2 slices. In the video above, we do just that and actually cut our final piece in half and not in thirds. If your carrot is wider, then you may need to slice it into quarters. The idea is to cut carrot sticks in roughly the same size, not that we make the same number of slices each time.
Ready to show off your knife skills? Check out our Roasted Vegetables recipe.
Have you tried this? Leave me a comment and let me know how it went.
