Production, carrot

Carrot production for human consumption in this cormtry is now a large and specialised enterprise for most growers. Carrots are grown for mat different markets - fresh, frozen and processing - and quality requirements of the buyers can be exacting. Uniformity and freedom from damage and disease are very important. Carrot out-grades and rejects may be fed to hvestock. 

The loss of active ingredients suited to carrot production means that increasingly machine and hand weeding may be needed to control weeds such as fool s parsley, hemlock and wild carrot, which are difficult to control with herbicides. Volunteer potatoes also pose a problem in carrots. Particular care is needed in managing weeds where crops are grown tmder plastic. 

Amadori compounds have been identified in various processed fruit and vegetable products, for example, in commercial carrot products (juices, babyfoods, tinned and dehydrated carrots). While these products showed fairly low rates of amino acid modification (up to 5%), dehydrated carrots contained Amadori products corresponding to a lysine derivatisation of up to 58% and nearly 100% derivatisation of y-aminobutyric acid. Besides the Amadori... 

Czepa A., Hofmann T. Quantitative studies and sensory analyses on the influence of cultivar, spatial tissue distribution, and industrial processing on the bitter off-taste of carrots (Daucus carota L.) and carrot products. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 52 4508-4514 (2004). 

Discrete pieces of product, such as peas, slices of carrot, beans and items of this size, can be conveyed on a perforated belt, with the cold air blasting up through the holes, to both cool the product and agitate it, to prevent it sticking either to the belt or to other similar pieces. This type of cooling tunnel is shown in Figure 19.1. 

Carrots were also the main sonrces of a-carotene, whereas tomatoes and tomato prodncts were the major sources of lycopene. Lutein was mainly provided by peas in the Republic of Ireland and United Kingdom. Spinach was found to serve as the major source in other countries. Lutein and zeaxanthin xanthophylls are found in a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, particularly green leafy vegetables, but also in some animal products such as egg yolks. In all countries, P-cryptoxanthin was obtained primarily from citrus fruits. 

Fortuitously, the bacterial gene product, CRTI, produces di -trans carotenoids and satisfies the stereo-chemical specificity of LYC B for all-trani substrates while also catalyzing the four desaturation steps from phytoene to lycopene. Nevertheless, over-expression of Crtl has been shown to have only a modest effect (two- to fourfold increases in tomatoes and carrots) in increasing flux through the pathway and some unexpected pleiotropic influences on activities upstream and downstream of the desaturations (reviewed by Fraser and Bramley and Giuliano °). 

Color plays a special role in the foods we eat. For example, when confronted with a food of an unattractive color, the consumer assumes the food is of poor quality or is spoiled. Similarly, a product with an atypical color, e.g., a green cheese or a blue drink, in most cases would be rejected by the consumer. Typically, one associates certain colors with certain food items such as cherry with red, lemon with yellow, and orange with carrot. Therefore, color can serve as a primary identification of food and also as a protective measure to prevent the consumption of spoiled food. Food colors create physiological and psychological expectations and attitudes that are developed by experience, tradition, education, and environment we inevitably eat with our eyes. ... 

The present paper demonstrates applications of combinations of cloned monocomponent enzymes, including combinations with rhamnogalacturonases, for production of cloud stable apple juice, gelation of fruits, degradation of soy cell walls, production of dietetic soy and production of carrot puree are demonstrated. 

It is worth noticing what other products are likely to share the same aisle or shelf. In a study on how to increase purchases in the Minneapolis and St Paul markets in the USA, by including organic products, a mixed effect on sales was found in upmarket stores, but there was a significant positive effect on sales of dairy products, pasta, bread, cereal and carrots in a discount store (Thompson, 1998). 

The parameters, mentioned however, have not been clearly interpreted in terms of quality, i.e. what aspect of quality is measured The IQC provides a framework for further investigations to demonstrate the meaning of these parameters. In the apple and carrot experiments of the Louis Bolk Instituut, we demonstrated some experimental parameters in food products grown with different balances between growth and differentiation. Biocrystallisation pictures in particular, are able to show both the life processes of growth and differentiation, and their integration. In future we expect to find the key to work out the relevance of coherence for health in the balance (the integration) between the life processes. 

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