The history of baby carrots – let us find out if they’re really baby carrots. Or even real carrots.

Baby carrots are the creation of a California farmer named Mike Yurosek, who came up with this darling snack food in the late 1980s.

At the time – and this is still true today, to some degree – consumers expected their produce to look a certain way. Carrots had to be a good color, free of dirt, and carrot-shaped. Of course, this is often not the reality.

Yurosek ended up throwing away as much as 400 tons of carrots a day because of their imperfections – they were too lumpy or twisted, and therefore wouldn’t sell. He wanted a way to utilize what would otherwise be wasted food.

Using an industrial bean cutter, Yurosek was able to cut the gnarly, unwanted carrots into 2-inch sized pieces. To complete the job, Yurosek transferred the small carrots to a packing plant and finished them off with an industrial potato peeler.

In other words, Yurosek was trimming away the “bad” parts of the carrot, leaving a miniature and uniformly sized carrot in its place.

Yurosek provided samples of his tiny carrots in addition to the regular ones to one of his best customers, a Los Angeles supermarket. They called him right back. Baby carrots were delivered again immediately.

Within just a few years, more and more supermarkets began carrying this nifty product. Baby carrots remain popular today as a healthy alternative to most snack foods.

However, although baby carrots are in fact actual carrots, they’re arguably not “true” baby carrots.

A real baby carrot can be distinguished by being wider on one end, like regular carrots. True baby carrots are regular carrots, picked immaturely.

What we know to be baby carrots  are actually baby-style cut carrots, bred to be created into the 2-inch gems they are. They’re harvested about 40 or so days earlier than other carrots.

The baby-style cut carrots are grown to be sweeter than other carrots with a brighter shade of orange. They’re planted close together in loose soil, encouraging the roots to grow in a slender shape.

Of course, we must ask the question, are the baby carrots as nutritious as the regular ones? 

According to LiveStrong.com, the amounts of beta-carotene, vitamin C, vitamin K, and potassium are all lower in baby carrots than in regular. However, the fiber is about the same.

Also, baby carrots are still *real* carrots, even if they’re not real baby carrots. Choose them when you’re craving a quick bite, instead of potato chips or cookies.

Try pairing with some hummus for a truly tasty treat.