Carrots are derived from a Middle Eastern crop called Queen Anne’s Lace. This wild ancestor is also a taproot crop but has a white root. For thousands of years, the carrot was not a popular vegetable because it had a woody texture and was difficult to eat. A subspecies of this plant has been selectively bred over centuries to produce the crisp and sweet garden vegetables that we eat today. Today the largest producers of carrots are China, the United States, Poland, Japan, and France.