Grow Your Own Magazine

I was in Lakeland yesterday and saw they had violet petal and rose petal conserve. They looked beautiful but certainly weren't cheap Has anyone tried making anything like that? I imagine you probably need a fearsome amount of petals??? What do they taste like?

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Stand up now diggers all

Haven't made it myself, but this recipe BBC - Food - Recipes - Rose petal jam calls for 1lb of strongly-scented rose petals, so get growing now if you want to make it for later! I should imagine it would taste a bit like Turkish delight, no? That's flavoured with rosewater, isn't it? (Proper stuff, I mean, not Fry's!!)

Wow...I must try that.....Just hope I've got enough rose petals.

I tasted at a local food fest, [not the lakeland version] It was really wonderful. I would never get enough petals to make it.

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I have made rose petal vodka.....lovely!

does it take a lot of petals?

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Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful..William Morris

yes and no Shirley, depends how much you make.
I did it in a le parfait jar (wide neck is needed)
I used an old english rose called chianti, its' dark and has very 'rose' smelling flowers
I filled half the jar with petals then topped it up with vodka, left it in a dark place till the colour had gone from petals, squished gently the petals in strainer to save a much vodka as possible and put in fresh lot of petals.
Squished again. got rid of petals.
Added lots of sugar and left it as long as possible- about two days - rude not to try it I thought! still have some left almost 11 months on! it's still lovely.
I will make more this year :-)

Great ideas - I'm surprised that petals have enough pectin in to set. Might give it a try, at some point, though I was planning to try rose petal wine this year (having finally got enough fragrant roses for a surplus of petals).

Don't forget elderflower too. Elderflower wine is very easy to make and very nice.

I have a recipe if anyone is interested ( off the top of my head:
1 pint elder flowers, with as much green removed as possible;
juice of 1 lime and 1 orange
knob of root ginger, scored
3lbs of sugar

Place elderflowers in pan with juice of lime and a knob of ginger, and cover with boiling water to sterilise. Leave to infuse for 24-48 hours. Then strain, and add 3 lb sugar, previously boiled with a small amount of water to make a syrup. When cool, add everything to a demijohn with the yeast. I use Sauternes/desert wine yeast.

Rose Petal Conserve (makes about 4lbs.)
2 pts. well scented rose petals
2 pts. water
juice of 1 lemon
21/2 lbs. sugar

Put UNRINSED petals in pan with water and simmer gently for 15 mins. Pour into a bowl and leave to get cold. Strain liquid back into pan and reserve petals. Add strained lemon juice(which will send the liquid a much darker pink) and add sugar.
Heat slowly to dissolve sugar,put in rose petals then bring to the boil. Boil fast for 10 mins. Remove from heat and por into warm,steilized jars.Cover when quite cold.

Taken from Pamela Michael's "All Good Things Around Us"
She gives this recipe for wild roses but you would need an awful lot of them! Red or pink garden roses do just as well.
I do hope someone tries this as it has taken me three tries to get it to you. The first time I accidentally deleted it and the second time I forgot to click on the post button!!