International Carrot Day

Celebrating Carrots

Having not too long ago celebrated Worldwide Carrot Day,¹ it’s essential to do not forget that the common-or-garden carrot is a staple root vegetable in lots of houses throughout the globe and is an especially versatile ingredient to make use of within the kitchen. Carrots are native to Europe and Southwestern Asia, and it’s believed that they’re more likely to have originated in Iran.

In Britain, roughly 700,000 tonnes of carrots are produced yearly which quantities to roughly 100 carrots for each particular person per yr.² To place this quantity into perspective, the entire weight of the London Eye is 1,700 tonnes, so that basically is a powerful variety of carrots!

A rainbow of colors

Essentially the most conventional color of the carrot is orange, however they do in truth are available in quite a lot of colors, often known as rainbow carrots, together with black, pink, yellow, white, and purple. Looking for completely different colored carrots might be an thrilling manner to brighten up your plate and have a good time consuming the rainbow, which may do wonders for intestine well being. It promotes consumption of a wider vary of polyphenols. These are naturally occurring chemical substances present in vegetation and have been proven to have many well being advantages, together with antioxidant and anti inflammatory properties. There are over 8,000 varieties of polyphenols and every sort lends itself to the colourful colors in vegetables and fruit.

Dietary worth of carrots

80g (roughly 3 heaped tablespoons) of carrots counts as 1 of your really useful 5-a-day³ and are an actual dietary powerhouse. They comprise many various nutritional vitamins and minerals similar to potassium, vitamin Ok and calcium. We’ve put the highlight on three extra vitamins present in carrots under.

• Fibre: Carrots are an important supply of dietary fibre which gives gas for the pleasant micro organism throughout the intestine. Within the UK, the really useful day by day consumption for fibre is 30g, nonetheless, solely 9% of adults meet this advice.⁴ One medium-sized carrot will present roughly 1.8g fibre. Hold the pores and skin on too for an additional enhance!
• Beta carotene: Carrots are an important supply of beta-carotene. This can be a dietary compound that, as soon as ingested, is transformed into vitamin A through the liver. It’s beta-carotene that’s accountable for the colourful orange color of carrots.Fantasy buster: Do carrots actually make you see at the hours of darkness?

That is primarily simply an outdated wives story that originates from a World Conflict Two propaganda marketing campaign, nonetheless, it does maintain some reality. Vitamin A contributes to the upkeep of regular imaginative and prescient, so it is necessary for eye well being. Deficiency of vitamin A results in a better threat of night time blindness (nyctalopia), so consuming extra carrots with a view to enhance vitamin A consumption might be helpful for these experiencing deficiency.⁵ Sadly, for these with ample ranges of vitamin A, consuming a surplus of carrots is not going to grant you with night time imaginative and prescient superpowers!

• Vitamin C: While not the primary vegetable that may come to thoughts when fascinated about vitamin C, a medium-sized carrot gives roughly 3.6mg of vitamin C, contributing properly to the really useful day by day consumption of 40mg for adults aged 19 – 64 within the UK.⁶ Vitamin C has ample advantages together with, however not restricted to, contributing to the traditional perform of the immune system which communicates carefully with the intestine microbiome, the discount of tiredness and fatigue, and aiding iron absorption.

Right here at Love Your Intestine, we don’t normally want any encouragement to have a good time greens so why not strive these tasty recipes celebrating carrots!

Love Your Intestine recipe inspiration

High tip: Keep away from meals waste and get some additional dietary goodness by utilizing up the inexperienced carrot tops. Roast them, mix them in a sauce, or sprinkle them in a salad.

References

1. Carrot Day (2025) The Annual Worldwide Carrot Day. Accessible at: International Carrot Day (Accessed: 06 March 2025)
2. Nice British Carrots (2025) Carrot Manufacturing Elements. Accessible at: Carrot Production Facts | Great British Carrots (Accessed: 11 March 2025)
3. NHS (2020) 5 A Day: what counts? Accessible at: 5 A Day: what counts? – NHS (Accessed: 06 March 2025)
4. The Meals and Drink Federation (2024) Motion on Fibre. Accessible at: Action on Fibre | The Food & Drink Federation (Accessed: 11 March 2025)
5. Sajovic et al. (2022) Int J Mol Sci, 23(3): 1014
6. NHS (2020) Vitamin C. Accessible at : Vitamins and minerals – Vitamin C – NHS (Accessed: 11 March 2025)