Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Rose Petal Jelly

This must be what it tastes like to be a humming bird!
I happened to come across a site that showed how to make flower scented jellies ~ it's incredibly easy and the end product is delicious!

The ingredients you need are:
1 cup packed fresh flower petals
3 cups of water
Juice of one lemon
1 box powdered pectin
4 cups sugar

I picked these rose petals from our back yard. The more heavily scented the rose, the BETTER! You can make this jelly with practically any flower like hibiscus, violets, jasmine, bee balm, etc...just make sure they are not sprayed with any pesticides.
Bring the water to a boil in a small saucepan and stir in the roses. Remove from the heat, and let the mixture steep for 10 minutes, as if you were making rose-petal tea.
Strain the "tea" making sure to squeeze the petals to get every last drop of flavor out of them.
Now this is where the magic happens:

Pour in the fresh lemon juice and the "tea" turns back into the color of the flowers you used! My petals were mostly pink and the resulting liquid looked like a watermelon Jolly Rancher when I poured in the juice. You should have exactly 3 cups of liquid after the lemon juice is added, if you don't, put in enough water to make 3 cups. Now pour in your pectin and dissolve.


Over the highest possible heat, bring the mixture to a boil and add the sugar. When the solution returns to a hard rolling boil, time it for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. After 2 full minutes, transfer the jelly to hot, sterilized glasses and seal according to manufacturer's suggestions.

As soon as these beauties cool you can store them in the fridge for up to three months. I wanted to give some of these as gifts so I processed them in a hot water bath for 10 minutes to seal the lids.

The taste is divine!
See that little hummer on the feeder eying my jelly?

I can't wait to make homemade labels and tie them up with pretty ribbon to give as Mother's Day gifts!

14 comments:

Kalona said...

How pretty! You come up with the most wonderful ideas.

Athena at Minerva's Garden said...

I love the picture with the jelly and the hummingbird in the background! The jelly looks so beautiful in the light.

fluerdelyis said...

So pretty and I am sure so tasty.

Chris Ann

I found your blog via of Jamie's blog
Tuesday Garden Party

Anonymous said...

If you've actually sterilized the jars and they sealed, it does not need to be in the fridge and should still last a couple years.

Thanks for the recipe! This is great!

Anonymous said...

I wonder is there any other sweetener besides cane sugar that can be used to make jellies successfully? I know granulated Xylitol looks and tastes just like sugar, but is not digested in the same way & diabetics can eat it with no problems. Baking with it works, but jelly...I don't know.
And sterilized, sealed jars can last several years. We discovered this when I was young & my mother spent 1 summer canning EVERYthing!

Lizzie said...

Would honey work?

Unknown said...

Hi,
I am from Greece and I've eated rose petal jam which is delicious over icecream or Greek yogurt. I wonder if I could use your recipe to make the jam leaving the petals instead of sieving them. The texture and the taste of the petals in the jam is out of this world!

Pocket Full of Posies said...

What lovely little gems:)

JoAnnC. said...

To my knowledge, honey doesn't work in making jelly. I might be wrong. Markella, I have seen some rose petal jelly with the petals left in and it is gorgeous. My kids would never go for it though!

adela said...

hi! among the ingredients, the recipe ask FOR A BOX OF PECTIN. can you specify the weight in grams, or ounces, or tablespoons etc? thank you!

Adela said...

hi JoAnn!

your recipe asks for "a box of pectin". can you specify the actual weight of the one you used? where I live, the boxes have 3 envelopes of 40 gr each.

I'm dying to make this jelly because I have tons of gorgeous old english roses (David Austin's)

Thank you for sharing!

JoAnnC. said...

Adela, It's a standard box of powdered Sure Jell pectin. The weight on the box is 1.75 oz. I have never, ever had luck with liquid pectin so I stick with the powdered. Hope your beautiful roses make some delicious jelly!!!

Angela said...

You might try substituting part of the water with frozen apple juice concentrate for your sweetener. I use this in cobblers & pies and it works great! I haven't tried it yet for jams.

JoAnnC. said...

That's a great idea! I think I might try it!