Rose hips

[Psalehesost]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rose_hips

There is not a single mention of those on the board, and I have been thinking about posting about them for a while. I often blend things with rose hip powder; is there (I would guess not) any known problem with it? If not, it can be used for all manner of things: If sweetened and combined with something thickening, you can cook soup of it; if sweetened and blended with some flax seed, buckwheat, or something else that works well (found out by trying it), you can get a nice, thick drink - or if you make it even thicker, it goes well to eat with buckwheat flakes, sunflower seeds and other such things.

 

[Psalehesost]

If you put rose hip shells in water for about 5 hours (or more, does not matter) and then - optionally, my preference - add, in addition to sweetening, some cocoa powder and then some of either buckwheat flakes or millet flakes when cooking it up (for some minutes, 5 or so), you get a nice, rather thick cream that goes very well with buckwheat pancakes (make sure to have some water at hand, due to its thickness). I have it by taking a piece of buckwheat pancake, applying a decent helping to it, and then wrapping it around it. Doubles, as with rose hip things in general, as a nice C vitamin supplement.

 

[Stevie Argyl]

My family would have rosehip jam when we were young, my gran knew tons of old recipes and old folk remedies and even beat the doctors at times - ie her remedy worked better.
Thanks for bringing these up you have brought back some memories for me and some useful info for others.

Will rosehip jam still be a source of vit C or would it be destroyed by cooking do you know?

 

[Psalehesost]

As far as I know, and which seems to be confirmed by various sources having now searched on it, cooking is fine. (one source, whether true or not, however says that use of aluminum cookware in cooking them is detrimental in this regard, though one wouldn't want to use it anyway)

EDIT: Further searching and reading:

Vitamin C chemically decomposes under certain conditions, many of which may occur during the cooking of food. Vitamin C concentrations in various food substances decrease with time in proportion to the temperature they are stored at and cooking can reduce the Vitamin C content of vegetables by around 60% possibly partly due to increased enzymatic destruction as it may be more significant at sub-boiling temperatures. Longer cooking times also add to this effect, as will copper food vessels, which catalyse the decomposition.

So perhaps not so good after all, though I'd think enough remains to be useful when cooking, as is done, rose hips for a couple of minutes.

Though another explanation to the contrary is suggested here:

A common misconception is that boiling must surely break down the level of vitamin C in the rose hips. Enzymes are in fact responsible for this occurring and become active in temperatures well below boiling point. They cannot however survive in boiling water; subjecting the rose hips to this heat minimises the opportunity for the enzymes to establish a foothold.

Hmm...?

 

[Stevie Argyl]

Intersting, Thanks Psalehesost

As for aluminium, I havent used anything with it in it since the initial alzheimers scares many years ago, might even have been the 80s, yikes I am getting old. Now they try to say its safe again, but I love my cast iron and fired earth cookware - i'll never go back :)

 

[birger]

I found these details on raw Rose Hip:

_http://www.foodcomp.dk/v7/fcdb_details.asp?FoodId=0094


100 g rose hip contains 840 mg vitamin C - that is a lot.


This is an interesting web site, containing details on a lot of food.
It is also possible to press on f.ex. Vitamin C - this will bring up a list of all registered food containing vitamin C:

_http://www.foodcomp.dk/v7/fcdb_foodnutrlist.asp?CompId=0050

The complete list is here:
_http://www.foodcomp.dk/v7/fcdb_nutrlist.asp

 

[EGVG]

I've used skin care products with rose hip as the main ingredient, and it was amazing!! Ultra moisturising, perfect for the winter months!! ;)