Carrots

Carrots are a root vegetable, usually orange or white in color, with a woody texture. The edible part of a carrot is a taproot. It is a biennial plant which grows a rosette of leaves in the spring and summer, while building up the stout taproot, which stores large amounts of sugars for the plant to flower in the second year. The flowering stem grows to about 1 m tall, with umbels of white flowers. The carrot is a domesticated form of Queen Anne's lace, a wildflower. It has been bred for specific traits, but is still the same species.

Carrots can be eaten raw, whole, chopped, grated, and / or added to salads for color or texture. They are also often chopped and boiled, fried or steamed, and cooked in soups and stews, as well as fine baby foods and select pet foods. Grated carrots are used in carrot cakes, as well as carrot puddings an old English dish thought to have originated in the early 1800s. The greens are edible as a leaf vegetable, but are rarely eaten by humans. Together with onion and celery, carrots are one of the primary vegetables used in a mirepoix to make various broths. Since the late 1980s, baby carrots or mini-carrots (carrots that have been peeled and cut into uniform cylinders) have been a popular ready-to-eat snack food available in many supermarkets. Carrot juice is also widely marketed.

ß-carotene, a dimer of Vitamin A, is abundant in the carrot, and gives this vegetable its characteristic orange color. Furthermore, carrots are rich in dietary fiber, antioxidants, and minerals. Ethnomedically, the roots are used to treat digestive problems, intestinal parasites, and tonsilitis.

In early use, carrots were grown for their aromatic leaves and seeds, not their roots. Some relatives of the carrot are still grown for these, such as fennel, dill and cumin. The first mention of the root in classical sources is in the 1st century CE. The modern carrot appears to have been introduced to Europe in the 8-10th centuries; Ibn al-Awam, in Andalusia, describes both 'red' and 'yellow' carrots; Simeon Seth also mentions both colors in the 11th century.

Carrots come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes Carrot cultivars can be grouped into two broad classes: eastern carrots and western carrots. More recently, a number of novelty cultivars have been bred for particular characteristics.

Eastern carrots were domesticated in Central Asia, probably in modern-day Afghanistan in the 10th century, or possibly earlier. Specimens of the eastern carrot that survive to the present day are commonly purple or yellow in color, and often have branched roots. The purple color common in these carrots comes from anthocyanin pigments.

Carrots with multiple taproots (forks) are not specific cultivars, but are a byproduct of damage to earlier forks, often associated with rocky soil. he Western carrot emerged in the Netherlands in the 15th or 16th century, its orange color making it popular in those countries as an emblem of the House of Orange and the struggle for Dutch independence. The orange color results from abundant carotenes in these cultivars. While orange carrots are the norm in the West, other colors do exist, including white, yellow, red, and purple. These other colors of carrot are raised primarily as novelty crops. The Vegetable Improvement Center at Texas A&M University has developed a purple-skinned, orange-fleshed carrot, the BetaSweet (also known as the Maroon Carrot), with substances to prevent cancer, which has recently entered commercial distribution. Western carrot cultivars are commonly classified by their root shape:
'Imperator' carrots are the carrots most commonly sold whole in U.S. supermarkets; their roots are longer than other cultivars of carrot, and taper to a point at the tip. 'Nantes' carrots are nearly cylindrical in shape, and are blunt and rounded at both the top and tip. Nantes cultivars are often sweeter than other carrots. 'Danvers' carrots have a conical shape, having well-defined shoulders and tapering to a point at the tip. They are somewhat shorter than Imperator cultivars, but more tolerant of heavy soil. Danvers cultivars are often pureed as baby food. 'Chantenay' carrots are shorter than other cultivars, but have greater girth, sometimes growing up to 8 cm (3 inches) in diameter. They have broad shoulders and taper towards a blunt, rounded tip. They are most commonly diced for use in canned or prepared foods.

While any carrot can be harvested before reaching its full size as a more tender "baby" carrot, some fast-maturing cultivars have been bred to produce smaller roots. The most extreme examples produce round roots about 2.5 cm (1 inch) in diameter. These small cultivars are also more tolerant of heavy or stony soil than long-rooted cultivars such as 'Nantes' or 'Imperator'. The "baby carrots" sold ready-to-eat in supermarkets are, however, often not from a smaller cultivar of carrot, but are simply full-sized carrots that have been sliced and peeled to make carrot sticks of a uniform shape and size.
Carrot flowers are pollinated primarily by bees. Seed growers use honeybees or mason bees for their pollination needs.