DAUCUS CAROTA VARIETY SATIVA
Although the wild carrot called Queen Anne’s Lace grows just about everywhere in America, the vegetable we know as the carrot probably originated in Afghanistan, where the wild carrots are purple due to the presence of an anthocyanin, a phenolic coloring compound that functions as a coloring agent and a healthy antioxidant. From there, carrots were brought east to China and west to the Middle East, where the Romans called them carota, Latin for head or top (think carotid artery), and indeed used them for their aromatic leaves, much like we use chervil or parsley today. Their roots at that time were still small. The carrot traveled to North Africa and to Spain around 1100 ce. Before the 17th century, northern
European carrots all had slender yellow or purple roots. An anonymous author in 1533 wrote (correctly): “Parsnepes and carettes . . . do nourishe with better juyce than the other rootes.” It was the Dutch in the 17th century who bred carrots for size and for a rich orange color. Today plant scientists are breeding other colors back into carrots, and we can find carrots in colors such as maroon, purple, red, white, and yellow, as well as orange.
THE ORGANIC FACTOR
When carrots are organic, you get to use their flavorsome thin skins, and not have to peel them away. If the carrots have been drenched in the usual array of pesticides—about 6 million pounds used on California carrots alone in 2001—you had better peel those carrots.
NUTRITION
It’s no fable that carrots are good for you. They contain 7 milligrams of betacaro-tene per 100 grams, which we metabolize into vitamin A. Just 21⁄2 ounces of raw carrot provide the average person with 250 percent of his or her daily requirement of this important vitamin. Carrots are also sweet—they’re 2 percent sugar—which is why fresh carrot juice is such a creamy, foamy, sweet treat.
TYPES
We’re used to eating long, tapered orange carrots, but good carrots come in all shapes and sizes from long to short to stubby little golf balls. They also come in a range of colors. And be on the lookout for baby carrots—not the stubs sold in bags (these so-called baby carrots are ground out of larger pieces by machine and taste like it) but miniature whole carrots bred to develop full color and flavor while still small. Farmers have also been breeding certain varieties of carrots with elevated levels of vitamin A so they can be grown in parts of the world suffering vitamin deficiencies.
SEASONALITY
Carrots store well in the ground and so are available year around. But the peak season for carrots is midsummer through fall.
WHAT TO LOOK FOR
If you can, try to locate a local farmers’ market with fresh-pulled carrots available (just ask). If possible, avoid supermarket carrots; although carrots can be kept in the fridge for weeks, their ephemeral flavor and freshness will be gone after no more than a few days. Look for carrots that still have their tops on. Examine the foliage; it should be a bright, lively green and have the smell of fresh carrots. If the foliage is limp, losing color, and stale-looking, then odds are that the carrot will also be past its prime. If the carrots are topless, avoid them. If you can’t—because it’s wintertime, for instance—check the place where the foliage attached. ....read more
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