10/11/10 Large Carrots

This week's harvest is brought to you from my California garden (aka mom's garden space where I sowed some seeds earlier).  The last time I was here, I pulled a few impressive girthy carrots. I harvested the rest of the carrots this weekend, and I continue to be amazed at how well these carrots grow here, especially compared to the puny ones I've been growing in my Indiana garden.  They all came from the same seed envelope.

My attempt at a carrot bouquet

These are all "Short 'n Sweet" variety.  I'm thinking this one is more like "Long 'n Scary"

Or is this the scary one?

All these carrots came from this part of the garden (you can see the green carrot tops in the middle, before the harvest), which, as you can see, is fairly weedy and a bit disorganized by my standards.  Apparently these carrots like it better that way, compared to the pristine controlled environment of my square foot gardening beds in Indiana.

Here is the final carrot harvest after they've been bathed and groomed.  This harvest weighed 3 lbs, with the largest one weighing 13 oz.  I wondered if such large carrots may be compromised in flavor and/or texture, but these were still very juicy and sweet with no woody center core like some big carrots from the grocery store.  Curious, but, hey, I'll take it!  I grated the first few big ones to make some impromptu whole wheat carrot bread, in an attempt to avoid the sweet/rich pitfall of carrot cake.

Hop on over to Daphne's Harvest Monday for more fall harvests!

This post is also linked to Tuesday Garden Party.