Are there any flowers more recognizable than roses? Even botanophobes recognize their fragrant blooms. Throughout history, they have represented dynasties and revolutions, worldly powers and spiritual mysteries, purity and desire. They’re exchanged by lovers everywhere. But how often are we invited to taste them?
Members of the genus Rosa would be easy to identify even if they weren’t so familiar. Our northeastern roses are all woody shrubs with thorns along their stems and alternating, pinnately compound leaves. Check the base of a leaf stem, and you will find a pair of tiny, leafy wings called stipules, coming out of either side. Over the centuries, gardeners have selected roses that bear dozens of petals, but wild roses have only five. They are usually pink or “rose” in color rather than the dark red found at the flower shop. Many cultivated roses never fruit; their petals are too dense for pollinators to find their way in. But wild roses ripen into hips: round, reddish, fleshy fruits with five fingerlike lobes (calyces) protruding from the end.
Different roses are adapted to different habitats. The swamp rose (Rosa palustris) and shining rose (R. nitida) grow in swamps and bogs. The pasture rose (R. carolina) and Virginia rose (R. virginiana) prefer dry meadow. The non-native, invasive multiflora rose (R. multiflora) aggressively spreads along roadsides. And the seaside rose (R. rugosa) grows in the dunes along the sea. But all our local rose species are edible.
Rose petals appear mostly in June and can be eaten raw or added to salads. They taste much like they smell, a fact that some find off-putting, likening it to eating perfume, but I find them pleasant in small quantities. For culinary versatility, though, most foragers wait until the petals drop away and the flowers swell into hips.
The hips can be gathered as soon as they are plump and red or reddish orange. For most species, this happens in September. Their flavor is tart, almost like citrus. If you wait until after the first frost the hips become sweeter and take on a flavor that reminds me a bit of hibiscus. I have found edible hips on wild roses well into February, and time seems only to improve their flavor.
Gathering hips or petals can be slow going in the thorny branches, but you can accelerate the process with the right equipment. I wear tough pants, long sleeves, leather gloves, and sometimes Kevlar chainsaw chaps. Depending on the species, gathering this way can yield a quart of hips in less than an hour.
The insides of rose hips are full of hairy seeds that some people find irritating. I eat smaller rose hips whole, seeds and all, but species with larger hips, such as R. rugosa and R. virginiana, are easily cleaned. Just cut off the calyces with a knife, slice the hips in half, and scoop out the seeds with a spoon.
The pulpy exterior can be eaten raw, frozen, or dried. I have heard that they make tasty jams and syrups but have not yet tried that myself. You can brew the hips, either fresh or dried and ground, into a delicious tea. However you eat them, they are an exceptional source of vitamins and omega-3 fatty acids.
For millennia, roses have provided people with inspiration. We are asked whether they, by any other name, would smell as sweet? We are enjoined to gather their buds while we may. We are reminded that every rose has its thorn. But for just as long, roses have provided us with delicious and nutritious food – a beauty appreciated by the heart, the eye, and the palate.