Served cold, the tart, grape juice-like drink is most commonly called roselle juice in English. Served hot, it's hibiscus tea or Jamaica tea.
In English-speaking parts of the world, the plant goes by the names hibiscus, roselle, rozelle, Florida cranberry, flor de Jamaica, Jamaica sorrel, Indian sorrel, Guinea sorrel, sorrel, red sorrel, saril, sour-sour, Queensland jelly plant, jelly okra and lemon bush.
In French, it's oseille rouge or oseille de Guinée. In Spanish, it's flor de Jamaica, rosa de Jamaica, saril, sereni, quimbombó chino, agria, agrio de Guinea, agua de Jamaica, quetmia ácida, viña and viñuela. In Portuguese, it's vinagreira, azeda de Guiné, cururú azédo, and quiabeiro azédo. In Surinam, it goes by the Dutch name, zuring. It's known as bissap in Senegal, krajeap in Thailand, chin baung in Myanmar, and asam paya or asam susur in Malaysia. In Sudan, Egypt and elsewhere in the Near East, it’s known as karkadé or carcadé.
Hibiscus Calyces: Neither Fruits nor Flowers
It’s easy to mistake roselle for a juice in tropical countries because it’s commonly sold streetside and in food courts alongside fresh pineapple, orange, lemon and coconut juices. In Southeast Asian convenience stories, roselle is among the single-serving bottles and juice boxes. It also turns up, as a sherbet, in expensive ice-cream shops. Lately, it’s been appearing in Asia, imported from the U.S. and Europe, in upmarket coffee shops and gourmet grocery stores. But hibiscus tea has been consumed as a soothing evening tea for centuries in Egypt and elsewhere in the Near East. It probably first made a splash in the prettily-packaged US herbal tea market as an ingredient in Celestial Seasonings' Red Zinger tea back in the 1970s.
Botanically speaking, it's Hibiscus sabdariffa L. (family Malvaceae) and it’s the bushy H. sabdariffa var. sabdariffa that produces the edible products.The edible parts used to make “juice” or tea (actually, an infusion) or "agua de Jamaica" look like dark red dried-up buds. In fact, they’re not flower petals but calyces. It’s the calyx, the red, fleshy covering enclosing the flower’s seed pod, which is used for flavoring, cooking and food coloring. Calyces are harvested after the tiny yellow, pink or white sabdariffa petals dry up and fall off.
Africa to West Indies to Florida
The plant is native to India and Malaysia, where it’s been cultivated for hundreds of years, but it probably originated in Africa. Roselle seed pods may have been carried to the West Indies and Central America by African slaves. About 100 years ago, the seeds arrived in Florida, probably from Jamaica; roselle was a popular Florida home garden crop until home preserving waned the 1950s. Probably brought to Australia by colonial rulers of Malaysia or India, roselle was the basis for jams exported from two Queensland factories by the 1890s. That was around the same time that the US Department of Agriculture introduced the plant to the Philippines, where it has flourished along with the popularity of roselle drinks. The hot version is sometimes called "sour tea."
To make the juice or tea, residents in the Caribbean, Egypt, Mexico, Panama, Malaysia and West Africa may well be able to start with fresh calyces. (Discarding the seeds, chopped fresh calyces also go well with fruit or vegetable salads.) Hibiscus plants are easy to grow from seeds in Florida or in just about any warm climate. Shop for the seeds on online stores.
Flor de Jamaica's Nutritional and Medicinal Benefits
Most cooks, however, will have to rely on the dehydrated calyces, which may be sold as roselle or “dried hibiscus.” In health food stores in California and Texas, look for bags of dried calyces labeled "Flor de Jamaica." For everyone else, it’s now easy to buy roselle from online stores or gourmet shops specializing in herbs from Thailand, the Philippines, Mexico or Panama.
Although hibiscus is being studied, it hasn’t yet been proven to have the healing powers of bael fruit. It is high in calcium, niacin, riboflavin, vitamin C and iron, as seen on this Purdue University page. Hibiscus beverages have no caffeine. In East Africa, "Sudan tea" is consumed as medicine to cure coughs. In Guatamala, flor de Jamaica is believed to cure hangovers. In Senegal, a roselle extract is said to lower blood pressure. In India, Africa and Central America, infusions made from roselle calyces or seeds are prescribed as a diuretic, to stimulate bile production and to treat fever.
Recipes for Roselle Juice and Hibiscus Tea
To bring out the full citrusy flavor, the calyces must be boiled. Steeping in freshly boiled water, as with real tea, won’t work. Some cooks say the ratio should be 1:4: one cup of calyces to four cups of water, for example. Others contend that a smaller proportion of calyces is fine, as the recipe below shows. It probably depends on the source of the roselle. The depth of color and the zip is a function of the Ph level. The following recipe produces about 1 liter of liquid.
Ingredients:
* 2 cups of dried roselle calyces, washed (and with seeds removed)
* 2 liters of water
* Juice from one-half of a lemon or lime
* 3/4 cup of sugar or to taste
Directions:
1. Combine the calyces and water in a large pot and bring to a full boil. Remove from stove and let steep covered for 30 minutes. The color should be a deep red-purple, like some kinds of grape juice.
2. Strain off the liquid through a sieve and throw away the roselle.
3. Stir in lemon juice and sugar.
4. Serve hot or cold.
If it’s to be served hot, less sugar is needed to approximate that Red Zinger zip.
After removing the pot from the stove, cooks in Latin America often add a few slices of fresh peeled ginger root. Jamaicans often add rum and ginger to the cold version. In Africa, mint is often added. In Southeast Asia, lemongrass is sometimes added in the boiling stage.
Roselle combines well with fruit juices. Mix it with pineapple juice, orange juice and/or cranberry juice. Sprinkle with lemon slices, and perhaps rum, to make a very summery punch. Roselle also mixes well with vodka.
The boiled extract from calyces can also be the basis for a sorbet, a s seen here.
Susan Cunningham - I'm a well-traveled writer and editor living in Thailand. My travel articles have appeared in in-flights, newspapers and guidebooks.
Join the Conversation