Last year, I chipped frozen carrots out of the p-patch. This year, I decided not to bother. The ideal way to store carrots is in a root cellar, which I don't and can't have (probably a good thing, really), although I do blanch and freeze a few quarts of carrots during the summer. But what if, as our soil isn't frozen solid all winter, I just left the carrots in the garden until we needed them? Wouldn't that be sort of like having them in a root cellar, minus the baskets full of sand?
I am pleased to announce that this method of storing carrots seems to work. At least in my garden. They sat out there two weeks ago under a couple of inches of snow, and they are just fine. The greens even survived, declining to become a slimy mess in favor of being rabbit food for our neighbor's three rabbits (who also all survived the snow). This morning, I brought in about half of the carrots that were in the garden, promptly shredding the tiniest ones for carrot muffins, and they are in lovely shape: short but fat, brilliant orange, crisp and not the slightest bit chewed on.
When offered fresh, homegrown carrots for her lunch tomorrow, Caitlyn bounced around the kitchen. I'll take that endorsement, although I think she was more excited about the prospect of pretending to brush her teeth with a carrot like one of her classmates does than about the prospect of actually eating them...
Eventually, the carrots sprout new growth and consume the root to give it energy. But I don't think that will happen until the spring, and till then they'll keep well precisely because they're still alive.
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