Rose hips

If you cook them in a smallish amount of water and then strain off the juice, you can use it with cooking apples and sugar to make lovely apple and rose hip jelly. Usual jam/jelly-making routine. There are probably recipes on the net.

We used to put the seeds down the necks of our school-friends. These days we'd probably by in trouble for GBH.

I remember that trick Elegran
Here's a recipe for rosehip syrup - I haven't tried it though:
www.eatweeds.co.uk/rosehip-syrup-recipe

We have some very overgrown Rose bushes at the bottom of the garden. I was looking at the Rosehips yesterday very glad for this post, this afternoon we will be picking them. I will post how it goes.

You can make jam of them, but it is an almighty fiddle, as you have to scrape the pips out of each individual rosehip. (Or so I've been told; I've never made it myself) The jam is delicious though - I've eaten bought rosehip jam.

The main use in Germany for rosehips is as an infusion. I imagine that you just dry them and can pour boiling water on them. When I first arrived in Germany, back in the 1970s, this was what you would get if you ordered "tea" (That was a hard lesson to learn!) With luck there might have been alternatives available such as peppermint or chamomile. The tea companies have got much more adventurous over the years.

Rose hip tea is fairly insipid, though, and can be made a bit tastier by adding blackcurrants or elderberries.

That is where rosehip and apple jelly wins over jam, JackyB You strain out the millions of tiny hairs in the cooked fruit. Life is just too short to scrape them out of the hips.

I always make rosehip syrup.
4.5 pints water
2 pounds hips
1 pound sugar

Bring 3pints water to boil, add chopped hips, I top and tall and blitz in blender, simmer for 15 minuets,cool. Strain through muslin about 3 times. Add 1.5 pints of water and sugar, heat to dissolve, then boil rapidly for about half an hour or until nice and thick, not jammy ! Remember it thickens more when cool. Bottle.

I make two or three lots of this most years, family and friends fight over it. Yes it has sugar, but it’s full of vitamin c, and very soothing when you have a cold, I also use it to sweeten i in place of honey, or in fruit salad or over pancakes

I ended up making the jam. Had to cut each rose hip in half with scissors which was a bit of a faff, but worth it because the jam is delicious.
But thanks for all your ideas - have made notes in my recipe book so I can try something else next year.
Didn't see anyone else picking the hips, several people asked me what I was doing. We like picking blackberries too - I thought everyone picked blackberries, but apparently not.

I was put off by deeseeding but Jamie Oliver's way for rose hip syrup is brilliant.
Put whole hips into blender/nutribullet and smash them very briefly so they are broken but not mush. Then boil this in water and strain and add sugar to taste. It's so easy and lovely on top of ice cream or just as a drink and very good for you.

They are very good for treating Arthritis.

Are all hips and haws edible I ve never thought about it before I have a wild rambling rose with loads of hips on

All rose hips are edible, if you get rid of the hairs round the seeds. Haws from hawthorns make haw sauce ( a bit like chippy brown sauce).

Well blow me Thanks Elegran i d never have thought of eating them although I always used rose hip syrup

Some hedgerow recipes from Hugh Fearlessly-Eatseverything. www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2012/oct/12/wild-hedgerow-berries-recipes

I made sloe and rosehip wine once.

I've recently determined what has bothered me for years about chamomile tea: it is the dustiness of its taste. I now add a smidgeon of honey to chamomile tea, which makes all the difference, but I still leave the 'dusty' dregs in the bottom of the cup.

Does anyone else remember picking them and being paid 3d. a pound by whoever-it-was made rosehip syrup?

Lovely article Elegran,, thanks.

Elegran love the play on Hugh F-W's name! He is very good at enthusing people to make the most of the free foodstuffs which can be found and stuff that can be easily grown,
We are now finding it much more of an effort to do all the making and preserving of things but we have always done it and it is hard to stop, feels like giving in! We have just made our first apple and rosehip jelly of the season and are about to make some syrup to help keep the winter bugs at bay. We used to love the syrup as children. Rosehip tea is good for heart conditions but I find it needs honey or licorice to make it more palatable, it is good for arthritis too.
We planted a Kiftsgate climbing rose to go up the damson tree in our garden as it is supposed to have loads of hips which will be easier to get at since we don't go for long walks nowadays. It has really taken off in this second year since planting so hopefully we may even get a small crop of hips from it next year. We have some of the really old fashioned shrub roses which have big fat hips and make lovely jelly on their own but we tend to mix with apples as it goes further and we can then share it with the family. Autumn is busy!

It wasn't my invention, Synonymous, but that is how I have thought of him since I read it.

Elegran Undoubtedly, I will now also.

I've just thought - maybe it should be Hugh Fearlessly-EatsItAll.