Plant Stories
Rose Hip
Rosa canina · Rosa rugosa
After the roses have gone, the hips stay: glossy red-orange fruits that hang on the bare stems well into winter. They are sharp and fruity, a little like a tart apple crossed with a cranberry, and they have been gathered for winter syrups wherever wild roses grow.
- Family
- Rosaceae (rose family)
- Also called
- Dog rose, beach rose; shipovnik in Russian
- Parts used
- The ripe fruit (hip), with seeds and hairs removed
- Where I meet it
- Hedgerows, and the rugosa roses by the garden fence
Knowing it
Wild and old-fashioned roses — thorny canes, compound leaves of five to seven toothed leaflets — bearing oval or round red fruits crowned with the dried remains of the sepals. Dog rose hips are slim and oval; rugosa hips are fat and tomato-like.
Gathering
Pick when deep red and just softening. Many people wait for the first frost, which sweetens them. Leave plenty — birds and small animals depend on them in winter.
Drying & keeping
Halve and scrape out the seeds and hairs before drying, or dry whole and crack later. Dry slowly until hard.
Preparing
The fine hairs around the seeds are irritating to the mouth and gut, so hips are either deseeded or simmered whole and then strained through a fine cloth. They make syrups, teas, jams, and pastila.
What is known
Rose hips are a classic winter fruit across Northern and Eastern Europe. In Soviet households a thermos of shipovnik infusion was a winter staple, and children were given rose hip syrup by the spoonful.
During the Second World War, British schoolchildren and volunteers gathered hundreds of tons of wild hips for a national rose hip syrup, when oranges could not be imported. Children everywhere also know the hairs as itching powder.
Rose hip and apple is my favourite autumn pairing — the apple softens the sourness and gives body to drinks and pastila. The kitchen smells like a jam factory for a day.
Fresh rose hips are genuinely rich in vitamin C, though much is lost in drying and long cooking. Some studies of rose hip powder for joint discomfort have shown modest effects; the evidence is still limited.