Carrots

Carrots keep 3–4 weeks refrigerated, which is exceptional for a vegetable, and there is a simple technique that pushes it further.

Cut off the green tops immediately if they are attached. The leaves keep drawing moisture from the root, and a bunch of carrots with tops will go limp in days while trimmed ones last for weeks.

Store them in the crisper in a perforated bag, or — the method that works best — submerged in a container of cold water in the fridge, with the water changed every few days. Carrots stored this way stay crisp for a month or more.

Keep them away from apples and other ethylene producers; ethylene makes carrots turn bitter by inducing a compound called isocoumarin.

Carrots freeze well once blanched, for 10–12 months. Raw frozen carrots turn mushy.

Carrots are taproots — organs the plant builds to store energy through winter — so they are designed to keep. Their sugar content and dense structure make them among the longest-lasting fresh vegetables in a refrigerator.

Their main failure is dehydration. A limp, bendy carrot has simply lost water, and this is reversible: an hour in ice water restores much of the crispness as the cells reabsorb moisture. It is a quality issue rather than a safety one.

The white blush that appears on cut baby carrots is not mold. It is surface dehydration — a thin layer of dried-out cells scattering light — and it disappears if the carrot is rehydrated. This is another common case of good food discarded on appearance.

Carrots are notably ethylene-sensitive in an unusual way: exposure causes them to produce 6-methoxymellein, a bitter compound, as a stress response. Carrots stored with apples genuinely taste worse.

The real spoilage signals are sliminess, black or soft mushy spots, and a fermented smell. Soft rot in carrots is caused by pectin-degrading bacteria, and once a carrot is slimy it should be discarded rather than trimmed.