How to store carrots: 8+ effective ways

How to store carrots correctly: 8+ ways

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The article provides useful information on how to store carrots correctly: 8+ effective storage methods.

Carrots are one of the many vegetable crops grown by our gardeners and are difficult to store in winter. What methods and places have not been tried by our enterprising fellow countrymen, straining their inquisitive mind: a cellar, a balcony, an apartment and even a garden bed!

How to store carrots correctly? Based on the existing conditions, the labor intensity of the process and the availability of materials, choose the most suitable storage option for you from the storage options below.

How to store carrots: proper preparation for winter storage

It should be emphasized right away that this primarily affects the safety of the carrot crop. This is the timeliness and correctness of its cleaning!
According to the terms of ripening of the root crop, the package with the seeds will necessarily orient, or rather, the information that is indicated there. Do not rush to throw away the package, or mark in a notebook the approximate harvest day calculated on the day of planting.
Why is it so important? Because carrots pulled out of the ground early - besides the fact that they are not ripe, they do not have enough sugars, which means they are not tasty.

On the contrary, those root crops that are overexposed in the garden have an excess amount of sugar and amino acids. Such carrots actively attract harmful insects and even rats and mice.

If you are confused about the timing of picking orange root vegetables, you can navigate by the color of the tops. Pay attention to the color of the lower leaves. Once they turn yellow, you can harvest. You can also influence the taste of the carrots by not watering them before digging them up. Then the carrots will be juicy.

Once the carrots have been lifted out of the ground, trim off all of the tops. Without it, there will be more moisture in the roots. To begin with, cut off the foliage just above the growth point, and then cut off the top (cut thickness - up to 10 mm). Thanks to this method of pruning, carrots will not sprout and thereby retain their nutritional properties, there will be no withering of root crops, which means that storage will be the best.

The next stage after pruning is airing (under a canopy) or drying (in the sun for 2-3 hours).
The next week and a half, carrots are kept at 10-14 degrees. This is the so-called "quarantine" time, when slices and small mechanical damages go away on healthy fruits by themselves. This is not the case with patients - they make themselves felt.

Before you finally place the root vegetables for storage, it is worth examining them again, sorting out and removing the spoiled ones.

How to store carrots in the sand

This method is quite popular among our gardeners. Especially if there is a cellar, underground or garage space. Why sand? - you ask. The sand absorbs the moisture released from the fruit, protects against the formation of rot, and with its help a constant temperature is maintained. This means that it works for excellent keeping quality of carrots.

So, take a loamy sandy substance. There are gardeners who use moist sand and even add moisture themselves.The moistened sand is placed on the bottom of the container with a layer of 50 mm, then the carrots are placed (the fruits should lie freely and separately from one another. They are shifted as follows: a layer of sand - a layer of carrots ...

There are gardeners who do not like wet, but dry sand, and use buckets instead of boxes.

Storing carrots in coniferous sawdust

This option is implemented with the help of coniferous sawdust and containers (box). The main character here is sawdust, which prevents the germination of fruits and creates protection against harmful microorganisms, thanks to the presence of phytoncides.
They are overlaid in layers: a layer of sawdust - a layer of root crops ...

How to store carrots in plastic in winter

Take a bag with a volume of 5-30 kg and put the carrots. Store without tying the bag. In a cool room, the humidity inside the bag is sufficient to keep the roots strong and juicy. Carbon dioxide is formed there, and if the bag is closed, there will be too much of it, and the roots will deteriorate. In the open state, carbon dioxide will be in the right amount, and will serve as a prophylaxis against various diseases.

There is another compromise way when carrots are placed in closed polyethylene, but with air holes. If condensation drops form inside the bag, then the humidity is higher than the norm. And lime is placed not far from the bag. She will take on excess moisture.

We bury in a clay substance

This method requires clay, water, a box (or cardboard box), plastic wrap, and garlic. The main element here is clay, which forms a protective film on the surface of root crops. Imagine 2 options for placing root crops in a protective clay film.

- Pour water into clay (half a bucket), incubate for 24 hours, mix and add water.
After 3-4 days, the clay under the water layer acquires a creamy state. Then the boxes are prepared: a film is lined on the bottom, carrots are placed (the roots should not touch each other) and poured with liquid clay. They are waiting for the clay to dry. Then the roots are laid out again and again poured with clay, dried. The actions are repeated until the box is completely full.

- Prepare 2 mixtures: clay and garlic. Clay is diluted with water to a creamy consistency. Garlic cloves with a volume of a glass are scrolled through a meat grinder and diluted in two liters of water.

Carrots are not washed, but dipped first in a garlic mixture, and then in a clay mixture. Carefully lay out the carrots in the open air under a canopy, dry. Next, the roots are placed in boxes or boxes.

How to properly store carrots in moss

For this method, a wooden or plastic container and Sfagnum moss are suitable.
Unwashed and dried in the sun, carrots are kept cool for 24 hours. Then it is placed in containers in layers with Sfagnum moss. Moss, due to its porous structure, retains the required amount of carbon dioxide and, as it were, preserves root crops. It is important that light moss does not add weight to the carrot containers.

Store in pans

Take a large enamel pot (or several). Root crops are washed, the tops and tails are cut and dried in the sun.
Carrots are placed vertically in pans, a napkin is placed on top and covered with a lid. Containers with root vegetables are kept in a cool place. In this case, it will remain until the end of spring.

Store in onion and garlic peels

The essential oil released from onion and garlic husks works to keep carrots from rotting. The storage principle resembles paragraph 2, which tells about storing carrots in coniferous sawdust. Likewise, root crops are stacked in layers with husks. The advantage of this method is that the lightness of the husk does not add to the weight of the container with root vegetables.

You can store carrots right in the garden

A very interesting way of storing carrots is used by some vegetable growers. They do not dig it out, but cut off the tops and leave it in the ground until spring.

Of course, the place with root vegetables is carefully prepared for the winter cold. First, the beds are sprinkled with coarse sand, polyethylene is placed on the sand, and sawdust is poured onto it (dead leaves or peat are also suitable). And in conclusion, they put roofing material and another layer of polyethylene.
This shelter will help the carrots survive the winter and remain juicy and tasty.

Some more unusual options for storing carrots

- With a stretch film. First, the carrots are washed, trimmed, and each carrot is wrapped in cling film.

- Treatment of root crops with the help of infusion of needles or onion / garlic husks is often used (0.1 kg of husks / needles is infused in a liter of water for 5-7 days). The finished tincture is not only sprayed with root crops, but immersed in it for ten minutes, followed by drying and storage.

- Sometimes they use hot paraffin (sometimes beeswax is added to it), dipping dried carrots into it. Beeswax gives elasticity. This is a fairly effective method by which carrots are stored for up to five months at a temperature of 0-2 degrees.

- By dusting with chalk (200 g / 10 kg of root crops). Sometimes a thirty percent chalk suspension is used, after immersion in it, the carrots are dried. The chalk forms an alkaline layer that protects against decay.

- There is also known a method of wrapping each carrot in paper, newspaper or even dry leaves of Saracen mint. In fact, from rodents with mint (kanuferoy), it will be enough to enclose containers with carrots, and they will not work.

- A small amount of root vegetables in polyethylene can be placed in the freezer, having previously rubbed on a grater or chopped in a food processor.

For any way of storing carrots, it is important to pay attention to air humidity (90-95%) and temperature (0-1 degrees Celsius).

How to store carrots