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any of a class of organic compounds that are polyhydroxy aldehydes or polyhydroxy ketones, or change to such substances on simple chemical transformations, as hydrolysis, oxidation, or reduction, and that form the supporting tissues of plants and are important food for animals and people.
Contemporary Examples

In other words, “carbohydrate is driving insulin is driving fat,” says George Cahill, a professor at Harvard Medical School.
New Evolution Diet: Eat Like a Caveman Casey Schwartz January 3, 2011

Historical Examples

A carbohydrate is usually though not always essential for the growth of anarobes and serves them as the best source of energy.
The Fundamentals of Bacteriology Charles Bradfield Morrey

The food value it does have is carbohydrate in the form of sugar.
Woman’s Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 2 Woman’s Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences

These vegetables have their carbohydrate content still further reduced by changing the water in which they are cooked three times.
Dietetics for Nurses Fairfax T. Proudfit

The other great member of the starch, or carbohydrate, group of foods is sugar.
A Handbook of Health Woods Hutchinson

The largest proportion of carbohydrate lies in the center, this substance growing less toward the outside of the grain.
Woman’s Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 1 Woman’s Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences

Bread and butter afford a good combination of fat and carbohydrate.
Foods and Household Management Helen Kinne

Cereal starch is the most difficult of all carbohydrate matter to digest.
Encyclopedia of Diet, Vol. 4 (of 5) Eugene Christian

Any carbohydrate in the broth is destroyed by the Bacterium coli.
The Fundamentals of Bacteriology Charles Bradfield Morrey

The milk and the eggs are good tissue-building foods, while sugar is a carbohydrate and makes a good winter food.
Encyclopedia of Diet, Vol. 4 (of 5) Eugene Christian

noun
any of a large group of organic compounds, including sugars, such as sucrose, and polysaccharides, such as cellulose, glycogen, and starch, that contain carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, with the general formula Cm(H2O)n: an important source of food and energy for animals Informal term carb
n.

1851, from carbo-, comb. form of carbon, + hydrate (n.), denoting compound produced when certain substances combine with water, from Greek hydor “water” (see water (n.1)).

The name carbohydrate was given to these compounds because, in composition, they are apparently hydrates of carbon. In structure, however, they are far more complex. [Flood]

carbohydrate car·bo·hy·drate (kär’bō-hī’drāt’)
n.
Any of a group of organic compounds that includes sugars, starches, celluloses, and gums and serves as a major energy source in the diet of animals; they are produced by photosynthetic plants and contain only carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, usually in the ratio 1:2:1.
carbohydrate
(kär’bō-hī’drāt’)
Any of a large class of organic compounds consisting of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, usually with twice as many hydrogen atoms as carbon or oxygen atoms. Carbohydrates are produced in green plants by photosynthesis and serve as a major energy source in animal diets. Sugars, starches, and cellulose are all carbohydrates.