What is the white film on my wet carrots?

Question

I was juicing carrots tonight and was getting rid of (juicing) some older baby carrots that nobody wanted to eat. They felt a bit "slimier" than usual, but smelled fine, and I haven't had any problems with juicing slimy carrots in the past. However after juicing a few of them I looked a bit more closely and noticed that some of them - not all, but maybe 10% or so appear to have a faint white film over part or all of them.

The carrots smell perfectly good, but I am concerned as to what this film might be. Mold maybe? I started scrubbing each carrot off before juicing it but this was taking quite a bit of time, and now I am thinking there might have been some that got through before I started scrubbing.

I have looked in a lot of places trying to find out what this white stuff is, but all I see is a lot of people saying things like "take it back" without giving any reasons to do so and without even attempting to answer the question - is it mold? Some places say the white part is due to the carrot drying out - that can't be the case here, because the carrots are quite wet. Others suggest it is due to the treatment/processing of the carrots. Is it something that will make me sick if I drink juice made from carrots that have this film? Even if it is something that shouldn't be drunk, now I also need to know, what do I need to do to my juicer? Can I just run water through it to clean it out? Do I need to take it apart and scrub down and disinfect all the internal components?

Answer 1

Even though the surface may be wet, that white stuff is dehydration. It's the cells that are drying on the inside, not the surface of the carrot. It's referred to as "blushing", and it is harmless. Baby carrots are adult carrots that have been cut and polished. That polishing removes the very outer surface, making the baby carrots more susceptible to blushing than full sized carrots.

See related article here.

EDIT: I should have mentioned, soak the carrots in ice water for an hour right before you use them. That will temporarily get rid of most of the discoloration.

This is what the carrots look like when they are dehydrated:

Answer 2

as the carrots felt slimy but the sliminess took some effort to scrub off they actually had two problems: one being slime from early decomposition as having been prepared before bagging they had lost their outer protective layer and the sugary carrot surface is an excellent medium for bacteria to feed on, two the carrot is a very fibrous root and the scrubbing would 'fluff up' the fibres, three carrots od have a very short life even unscrubbed and in a fridge.