If you are a lover for roses and you grow every variety of it in your garden for beautification, think again! You can grow edible roses in your garden for beauty and for food. Any rose flower variety that meets criteria of beauty and edibility is worth giving a shot in your tiny garden. It is an amazing fact to note that some roses are not only edible but also downright more delicious.
The rose family
Roses belong to quite a famous family known as Rosacea. Their close relatives are almonds, peaches, apricots, cherries, pears, plums and more that are commonly found.
Edible parts of a rose
Don’t be fooled around with the thorny parts of a rose, in fact, almost every part of a rose plant is edible. Let me start with the leaves. Funny as it may sound, those leaves are downright edible, for more flavors choose the youngest leaves. Trust me you will ask for more. Simply pluck them with the fingernails or clippers if the rose plant is thorny. Rose leaves are good in tea leaf mix. When used on their own, its flavor is like that of black tea but caffeine. You can use rose leaves in herbal or dried tea mix.
Rosebuds are also edible
Those unopened buds are fully loaded with rose flavor. Cut the buds at the base with clippers just before they open to release petals. Pick your buds and leave some for your rose to produce petals and hips for beautification. After harvesting enough buds, you should leave them to dry in a tray indoors for almost a month. Thereafter, rosebuds make the best tea and can be used to flavor other dishes.
Rose petals are edible too
The fascinating thing about rose petal harvesting is that you can wait until it is almost wilting to harvest, just before they fall off when beauty business is over. There are several ways to eat rose petals. They can be different from culture to culture, but some of the most common ones include;
- Fresh rose in salads
- Chopped and mixed with honey to be used for spread, common in Greece
- Candied rose petals
- Rose petals used as colorful dessert garnish
- And much more
Rose hips
Ripe rose hips are a favourite edible part of a rose plant. Rose hips are false fruits because they are formed from a swollen stem and not developed from the ovary. Rose varieties each produce hips of different colors ranging from hues of red to orange colors. To harvest rose hips, wait until all the color has changed to red or orange and no green color remaining. Cut them off with a clipper at the base of the hip. Cut hips into half and remove seeds with your fingernails or a blunt knife.
Choosing the best edible rose plants
Not all roses are easy-to-grow or not all of them are equally flovored. Another important factor while choosing edible rose plants are whether they are own-root or grafted. Own-root are better than grafted when choosing edible rose plants. The best edible rose plants for hips are David Austin varieties.
Thank you for reading this far! Now peruse the following gallery for more inspiration.
Check my other post on Hibiscus and Cornflowers.
