How to Identify CARROTS in your share:
You know what these look like! We mostly grow orange carrots, but do grow some rainbow red and yellow ones for later in the season. Within the orange carrots, we grow some real quick maturing “baby” carrots as well as longer season varieties. Most of the time, we distribute carrots with their tops on, but we want to start experimenting more with loose (topped) carrots and see if we can wash them faster (if we can, it means that you can get more of these sweet gems in your shares!). The yellow and red carrots are less sweet in general, but have a hint more of that parsnip feel.
When it's in Season at Hartwood Farm:
Mid-July into the winter, first carrots tend to be super small and tender, getting bigger and sweeter as the season rolls along. Carrots can store into the next April, with the best storage varieties even getting sweeter in the heart of winter. Drought is the biggest carrot challenge—in dry summers, getting the seeds to germinate takes a lot of watering (three times a day!).
Crop Category and What it Tastes Like:
Roots, Snacks, and Salads
Carrots are one of the most versatile vegetables, good cooked almost every way, as well as enjoyed fresh or raw. They can range from less sweet/more carroty flavor up to a candy-like sweetness.
How to Handle and Store:
In the fridge in a closed plastic bag. They can last up to 8 months with proper humidity levels! Like all root veggies, carrots store best if you remove their tops first. (If you don’t they keep trying to grow, and the top sucks all the crunchiness out of the roots).
How to Prep for Use:
We usually don't peel carrots until late in the winter--our carrot skins are so tender since they are picked fresh. Just remove the stems and scrub over with a veggie brush. Smaller pieces cook faster than larger pieces.
Ways to Cook and Eat:
Can be prepared anyway you can imagine--carrots are so versatile that they can fit into almost any dish! One of the most common questions we get is how to use the carrot tops… the answer is that you can use them (we know of folks using them in stock, in soups, or to make a pesto), but we don’t (I’m mildly allergic to parsnips and carrots are in the same plant family and my favorite vegetable, but their tops just smell like parsnip to me!)
Quick and Dirty Hangry Farmer Go-To Preparations:
We eat a lot of raw carrots dipped in hummus or peanut butter or shredded over sandwiches and salads, but also love adding them to everything we cook. Our favorite preparation is roasting them, either in chunks in a pot roast, around a chicken, or with other root crops, or when baby, sliced in half and roasted in oil, salt, and pepper.
Typical time to:
Steam—3 to 10 minutes (we like 'em crunchy)
Saute—3 to 10 minutes, or until the softness you prefer
Bake—20 to 25 minutes if small, up to 50 minutes if larger
Boil—5 to 10 minutes (as a guess, we rarely boil them!)
Our Favorite Recipes:
Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting from the Kitchn—carrot cake is one of our favorites (we even had it at our wedding). I love the traditional Joy of Cooking version, but the kitchn version is super moist.
Carrot Soup with Tahini and Crisped Chickpeas—it’s easy to overlook (or eat them all before you get home) how good carrots can be in soup. Here’s a hearty and interesting take on carrot soup by Smitten Kitchen, but we also really like adding a few carrots to be the base of many of our winter soups and sauces (right after the onions).
Herb Roasted Carrots—this Cooking Light recipe works even without herbs (or you can mix up whatever you have, I like roasted red peppers or lemon salts), and is a basic, quick side!