We saw a bag of these the other day at Westside Market and did a double-take. Are we missing something? Are you eating yellow carrots?
We've seen yellow and purple carrots, mostly at the farmers' market, and of course there are orange and yellow bell peppers and orange and purple cauliflower. Vegetables come in all kinds of colors that aren't always the mainstream shade we see in the grocery store.
But we've never seen yellow carrots so uniformly packaged and mass produced. We dug around for some information, and the company pictured above, Cal-Organics, doesn't give specific harvesting or nutritional information that's any different from that of their orange baby carrots.
From what we can gather, yellow vegetables, including carrots, are high in lutein, which is good for your eyes and for preventing macular degeneration. Other than that, they'd simply be pretty on a crudite platter.
Does anyone buy yellow baby carrots? How do they taste?
Related: How to Make Carrot Flowers
(Image: FreshPlaza)
Magic One-Ingredient Ice Cream 5 Ways: Peanut Butter, Nutella, and More
Make Chocolate Magic Shell Ice Cream Topping with Only 2 Ingredients
Our reading list
Good Food to Share 
The Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces 
Apartment Therapy Presents 
The Eight-Step Home Cure 
Candy Stripe Teaspo...
30 DIY Projects for the 3-Day Weekend
Tina Wilson's Striking Style 
Comments (9)
Ikea often uses baby yellow carrots in their mixed vegetables in the cafeteria.
I had these a few weeks ago. They seem a bit sweeter than orange baby carrots, but otherwise, the difference is pretty small. The color *is* really pretty, however.
Wow I've never seen yellow "baby" carrots before. They're really pretty.
In orange carrots, alpha- and beta-carotene are the primary pigments that give them their orange color. According to this article from the USDA Agriculture Research, xanthophylls (which include lutein/zeaxanthin) are the primary pigments in yellow carrots (yellow carrots would be lacking the alpha/beta-carotenes). Beta carotene converts to vitamin A and is important for vision to function, while lutein/zeaxanthin accumulate in the back of the retina protecting from sun damage. Plant pigments are so cool!
Never seen yellow baby carrots. I've only seen yellow ones in Trader Joe's Rainbow Carrots - they're all regular size, and come red, white, yellow and orange. The yellows are my favorite! Sliced thin and lightly steamed, they're so sweet, they're like candy!
i use them... to pretty up salads! they taste the same as orange ones to me.
Never knew there were yellow carrots. Yet, I knew that purple carrot were the original and true color of carrots and their small journey to the more pleasing color of orange.
I never knew there were yellow carrots. They look anemic to me so I don't think I would buy them.
Funny how things come around: our current-day carrots actually stem from a white/pale yellow wild variety and over the years have been culitivated to today's orange colour.
I assume it has to do with the fact that the stronger coloured varieties were hardier, more uniform in size, stored better and looked more appetizing. And now we've culitvated them so far that new yellow varieties are coming back!
PS: the reason - by the looks of the picture and my limited knowledge of carrot packaging - why they look so uniform in size, is that many odd shaped carrots (bought at lower prices) are actually weedled down to a uniform shape. Thereby loosing many of the vitamins contained in the skin. This is why I always buy carrots I need to peel myself (unless I'm having a really lazy day :)).
EvaInNL
I think you are right EvaInNL, those are whittled away deformed carrots, not perfect little carrots. I find pre-peeled carrots not as fresh as when you peel them yourself so I never buy them peeled. They're quite expensive pre-peeled here too. About $10 for a kg of peeled baby carrots and around $1-2 for a kg of robust skin on adult sized carrots. I know which I prefer!