Raw carrots are naturally sweet and pair well with both sweet and spicy ingredients. Sometimes, you need to spice them up with an array of aromatic seasonings and herbs. It’s also a great idea to add other fruits, nuts, or vegetables that also pair well with a variety of spices. In the case of the this salad, you’ll use apples, raisins, and raw pistachios for their signature nutty flavor. Granted, if you have a nut allergy then you can omit the pistachios from this salad.

A traditional carrot salad tends to be sweet, creamy, fatty, and unhealthy. The dressing often contains too much mayonnaise, sugar, and salt. There are different variations of that salad and some include ingredients like canned pineapple, candied pecans, and sour cream. If you add all of those processed, preservative-laden ingredients to a salad, they cancel out the health benefits of the fruits and vegetables. In the case of this carrot salad, though, you use 100% natural, raw vegan ingredients that aren’t fattening or unhealthy.

There are two ways to prepare this salad. The first way is by chopped up the carrots and apple and adding them to a bowl with the rest of the ingredients. You give those ingredients a gentle toss and then serve. The other method is to add all of the ingredients to a food processor and process a few times to blend and combine everything. The choice is really up to you, but don’t over-process the ingredients because you don’t to eat a pile of mush. It should have a chopped texture!