Call me ignorant but I didn't know I could eat the fabulous little seed pods from the incredible rose bush my grandmother transplanted for me from her yard at least 8 years ago. I love my rose bush. First off, each time I look at the beauty it reminds me of my adorable English grandmother (who's passed as of several years back). I marvel at it's frail pink flowers each year. I thought it was enormous at over 5 feet tall until I just read they can grow to 10 feet. I think my neighbors despise it because it spreads like wildfire. I pull up the little plants in my yard every time I see one sprout but they've totally ignored the ones that have sprung up in their yard (it's directly next to my fence). So they have a scraggly jumble of incredibly pokey wild rose plants all huddled together on their side of the fence; neighboring my lovely rose bush. I would actually LOVE to grow another bush next to the current one but that would increase the amount of annoyance plants on my neighbors side of the fence and in all honesty the woman who lives there is very mean. I don't know if she would yell at me (even more/ she's yelled at me a few times over other things) if I caused additional pokey plants to spring up in their yard. Okay, I'm running off on a bunny trail here.
I saw on one of those wild Alaska shows people harvesting rose hips and I was like, "hey, I have a load of those in my back yard!" It says on Wikipedia that rose hips are incredibly high in vitamin C, that they also contain "some vitamin A and B, essential fatty acids, and antioxidant flavonoids." Also that they contain a good amount of lycopene which is a strong antioxidant. People use them to prevent colds and the flu. They're good for your skin. You name it, rose hips are like magical fruit. Who knew? Not me.
I'm totally harvesting my rose hips this year! I can promise you the bush is totally organic too. My Grandmother never used chemicals. I've never touched it with a chemical or plant food or anything; it's as organic as they come. Do any of you know about them, have any advice, or harvest rose hips yourselves? I'm hungry for some good info on them. I'm thinking at the very least I'll put them in smoothies. It appears the best way to use them is raw because drying them out or saving them for much time diminishes the vitamin C. But Rose hip tea is supposed to be excellent for skin. Any input would be great!
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| It was in full bloom a few weeks ago. But it's about ready for a second round. |
I intend to pin a plethora of rose hip ideas in the near future but for anything I find without a photo I will be linking it here for easy reference.
rose hip tea
I really like this write up about them too
I've never harvested them myself but during WW2 our government organised volunteers in the countryside to gather rosehips from the hedgerows to make rosehip syrup which was given to children because of its high vitamin C content.
ReplyDeleteThat's so great. The wikipedia article actually mentions that very fact! I'm going to have a stab at making rose hip syrup this fall and I'll see if my son likes it in his juice and or water. He's pretty good about eating anything we give him :-)
DeleteIKEA actually had a panna cotta dessert with rosehip last fall! :D
ReplyDeleteI've never harvested them myself, but I know a big rose bush in the forrest, so maybe this year :)
Rose hip tea is pretty common in Latvia/Sweden, but sorry to say it tastes like red water with no taste. (to me :) )
You should totally harvest them too! We can compare notes :)
DeleteRight now I'm set on putting some raw ones in Abner's smoothies, eating a few to see how they are, and maybe drying some for tea... I'll probably also make a small batch of jam with some. Maybe.