Here are three of the easiest methods for drying rose hips at home.
Rose hips are often included in vitamin C tablets, but they can also be used to make tea, jellies, desserts, and many other foods. They are very high in vitamin C and are considered the “false fruit” of rose bushes. Rose hips are bright-red fruits, yet a lot of people have never before seen them. While they have several medicinal benefits, rose hips usually have to be dried before you put them in any type of recipe. You can find them wherever you find rose bushes, and they are easy to find in the fall after the first frost if you live in more temperate climates.
Where to Find Rose Hips
All rose bushes have rose hips on them, but they only grow after the plant’s flowers fade. A lot of gardeners will cut off the blooms of their rose bushes in order to encourage new growth, but this means your rose hips won’t have the chance to develop. This is why even regular rose growers sometimes won’t see rose hips on their bushes. The one thing you’ll want to watch for when trying to find the right bushes for your rose hips is the location of the bushes. If you are interested in drying rose hips to make teas and other things, make sure the bushes haven’t been sprayed with any poisonous pesticides first.
How to Dry Rose Hips at Home
When you do find them:
- simply pick them off the stems,
- cut them in half,
- remove the hair and scoop out all of the seeds,
- then wash them thoroughly with water
- gently rinse the inside of the hips. Remember, only the fruit is to be dried for use.
Keep in mind that the hairy covering on rose hips can irritate your skin, so it’s best to do this while wearing gloves. After they’re de-seeded and cleaned, you can dry them using one of three different methods, which are described below.
Here is a nice tutorial on how to prepare your rose hips before drying.
Drying rose hips in your oven
This is usually the easiest way to dry rose hips. It is a bit time-consuming but it’s super easy to do, and we all have an oven at home. Here is how to do it:
- Place some type of baking paper on a baking sheet and place the washed rose hips in a single layer.
- Set your oven to 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Make sure you leave the oven door slightly ajar so that excess moisture can escape.
- Keep the rose hips in there until they become brittle – usually 6-12 hours.
- Never make the oven hotter because this can affect the rose hips’ nutritional value.
- Once the rose hips are nice and brittle, they are done.
Using the Sun to dry rose hips
This is a good method of drying out your rose hips because you can simply forget about them for a while, and the sun does an excellent job of drying them out.
To dry your rose hips in the sun, simply place them anywhere that they are exposed to direct sunlight, then leave them there until they become brittle. Make sure they’re in the direct sun for the best results, and you might want to consider placing a net or other object on top of them so that birds and other critters don’t eat them. The longer you keep your rose hips out to dry, the more important this tip becomes.
Dehydrating rose hips in a dehydrator
This is the easiest method for drying rose hips – if you have a dehydrator at home. I suggest a dehydrator with a rear mounting fan that allows the hips to dry at close to an equal time.
- Place the hips into the dehydrator at 135 degrees, and dry for roughly 6 to 8 hours. The hips are dried once they are firm and brittle to the touch.
How to store dried rose hips?
Store the dehydrated hips in a mason jar with an oxygen absorber. Long-term storage will require the lids to be vacuum-sealed using a jar sealer.
What are Rose Hips Good For?
There are some medicinal benefits of consuming rose hips. In fact, they are thought to do the following:
- Help relieve pain associated with rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis
- Help the immune system fight free radicals
- Prevent urinary and bladder infections
- Help with dizziness and headaches
- Help metabolize fat cells
Learn more about the health benefits of rose hips.
How to make rosehip tea?
And it’s super-easy to make rosehip tea after the rose hips are dried. Simply add 2-2.5 grams of the dried rose hips to 150mL of boiling water. Then, let the mixture steep for 10-15 minutes and drain the liquid. Afterward, you can drink the tea by itself or add your favorite sweetener to it before you drink it. The good news about rose hip tea is that there is no such thing as consuming too much of it. This means you can drink as much rose hip tea as you like! That being said, to get the best results from drinking rose hip tea, try to consume 500-750mg per day of the dried hips.
Here is a nice tutorial on how to make a rose hip tea:
If you are growing roses, there are other parts of the rose you can dry:
Step-by-Step: Drying Roses in Dehydrator
5 Easy Ways of Drying Rose Petals
Thank you for a wonderful image: the Spruce.
