Rosehips are the fruit of the rose hip or rose bush and can be used in cooking provided they have not been treated.
Until the end of winter, it is possible to harvest berries from wild rosebushes in the French countryside, or elsewhere, as these rosebushes are indigenous to many parts of the world. Those in your garden are also edible, if you have not chemically treated your roses...
Rosa canina is the most common variety, it is easily found, but there are several others:
- Rosa arvensis,
- Rosa pimpinellifolia (purplish fruits, very sweet),
- Rosa rubiginosa (the "rusty rose", its leaves smell like apple),
- Rosa gallica,
- Rosa sempervirens,
- Rosa moyesi (large gourd-shaped fruits)...
- Rosa villosa, or hairy rose, grew a few centuries ago at the gates of Paris.
Guillaume de Villeneuve, in "Les crieries de Paris", attests that there was an important trade of these berries in France in the Middle Ages. Rosehips were dried to be eaten in winter like prunes.
Depending on the species and the living conditions of the rosebush, the vitamin C content varies enormously, however, the rosehip is the champion fruit of all categories. A single small rosehip can contain more vitamin C than a large lemon, and rose fruit is also very rich in provitamin A.
These little fruits are also very good. It is possible to eat them raw, when they are ripe and well colored, but you have to be careful not to eat also the seeds and stinging hairs in the center of the fruit. Rosehips, whether wild or from your garden, soften after a few frosts, and it is easy to put them through a food mill to keep only the pulp.
You can also cut them in half to remove the inside, or cook them, a little, in boiling water until they are soft enough to pass through the food mill without any problem. This soft, acidulous and sweet pulp, but relatively dry and without juice, will be used to make jams, syrups, wines, liqueurs, creams and pastries, sweet or savory soups. It can also be used as a sauce for pasta or pizza (homemade...) in the evening: in the 50's the American food industry used rosehip pulp as an additive in ketchup.
