Rose Petal Jelly

Floral jellies and syrups are a lovely addition to your pantry. If you are unable to grow fruits and berries for jams, syrups, or jellies, floral options can make it easy to "harvest what you have" since many people can at least grow flowers. 

Roses are a common and much-loved flower to grow. They are particularly good to have in your flower garden, since both the petals and hips have many uses. We have foraged rose petals for several years now, but this is the first year we have actually made jelly from the petals. I have been so excited to try this recipe!

Making the Syrup

We used a rose petal jelly recipe we found online. We checked the online directions and quantities against the insert for the pectin to be sure that they instructions aligned. They did - in short, both said to boil one minute on the stove, add sugar, boil one minute, then can. I was a bit leery, because we have tried the "updated" instructions with the lesser boil time after adding sugar (the older directions called for a slightly longer boil time) once before, and the jam failed to set, even when following the quantities and times exactly. Nevertheless, since the quantities and boil times aligned well, we forged on.

First, we picked four cups of wild rose petals. We poured boiling water over the petals and allowed them to steep. Once they cooled, we put the jar in the refrigerator to continue steeping overnight. The instructions did not call for such a long steep time, but since we were fitting this in amongst work schedules, we had to break the process up between two days. 

The next day, we strained the petals out. We measured out 5 c. of liquid, added 2 T. of lemon juice, and poured it into a pot. We added a box of pectin and brought it to a boil. We boiled it one minute, then added 5 c. of sugar (Note: the original recipe called for 4 cups of liquid and 4 cups of sugar). We brought it back up to a boil and let it cook at a rolling boil for one minute. Once done, we ladled the hot liquid into jelly jars, put it into a hot canner, and canned it for 15 minutes (the original recipe calls for 10, but we needed to adjust for altitude).

When looking at the jars the next day, I thought the jelly hadn't set. This was okay with us, since it would be more of a syrup. We personally don't mind syrup because we enjoy using it to top waffles, pancakes, cheesecakes, ice creams, and puddings. 

We had one jar that didn't seal, likely because it tipped over in the canner (This was a good reminder for myself that putting in extra jars of water when the canner isn't full will help to stabilize the jelly jars and give you canned water). We put this jar in the refrigerator. We used it over the weekend and discovered that it wasn't syrup after all, just a lovely soft jelly.

The last time we tried a recipe with these time guidelines, our jam did not set. We fixed it by switching to the older set of instructions for the pectin. We obviously would have had a harder set to the jelly if we had used only 4 cups of liquid and 4 cups of sugar as the recipe called for, but with all the work to pick the roses, etc. I was happy to end up with an extra jar or two of jelly.

Fun Fact: 

We had mostly white rose petals for this batch of jelly, which produced a rather clear "tea" with a hint of yellow to it. Once we added the lemon juice, the liquid became pinkish orange. I was so happy that the color was different than the lilac jelly we made.

Discover More Ideas for Jellies, Jams, and Syrups:

We wrote about foraging for jams and jellies in an earlier post. You can find a list of forageable items from which you can make jams and jellies in that article. 

We also have a post on our website with recipe links for "Three Flowers You Can Forage to Make Jelly."

If you are interested in making peony jelly, check out our previous blog post on that experiment.

Three Flowers You Ca Forage to Make Jelly

Three Flowers You Can Forage to Make Jelly

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