A Salad of Roasted Carrots and Miso Dressing Without the Greens Louro's roasted heirloom carrot salad with miso dressing. I've been hooked on the combination of carrots and miso ever since my first bite of sushi restaurant salad dressing back when I was a kid. You know the stuff: chunky, orange, gingery sauce coating the inevitable bowl of iceberg lettuce that appears before your California roll. What makes it so compelling is the interplay of sweet carrots and savory, salty miso paste; any salad greens are incidental, necessary only for structure. While I still adore that salad dressing, my grown-up self also appreciates more sophisticated expressions of the components. My latest favorite is at Louro restaurant in Greenwich Village. There, the chef David Santos serves a salad of roasted heirloom carrots atop an artful smear of sweet and salty miso dressing. The multicolored carrots are tender and lightly glazed from being roasted with a touch of sugar. And the miso sauce, quickly whipped up in a blender, is just the right salty counterpart. Other than the dressing and the carrots, the only other element is a sprinkling of fresh scallion, which adds crispness and brightness. That means, unlike with the sushi bar salad dressing, there's no superfluous lettuce to get in the way. At Louro, Mr. Santos holds a blowtorch to the dressing to toast it before piling on the carrots. It creates a pleasing smoky element. But I skipped that step at home and didn't miss it. If you have a torch, feel free to give it a try (use a heatproof platter for serving). Either way, this is an elegant yet simple salad that would be just as fine served alongside a homey roasted chicken as it would as an appetizer at your fanciest dinner party. And it would probably even go well with sushi. Recipe: Louro's Roasted Heirloom Carrot Salad With Miso Dressing