Hips and Haws

If you’re a certain age, you may have been given Rose Hip Syrup as a child. The bright red round and oval gems were used as a tonic to prevent winter colds because they’re rich in vitamin C. But did you also know they were baked in tarts, added to wine, marmalade and made into  soup? Best of all, they were used as anti varicose vein tea!

Now, the only thing I’ve ever done with haws is mix them with crab apples to make jelly, what about you? Well apparently, since Roman times the cheerful sprays of berries have been picked not just for jellies and jams, but to make wine and as a cure for the headaches that drinking might have caused! Women also gathered them for dyeing their hair, I touched mine up yesterday, I wonder if it’s worth a try.

I’ve always fancied myself as a medicine woman, a curandera, perhaps in a previous life.

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