To help you REALLY get ready for roses and summertime, here's a suggestion for you to use your new coping mechanism.

Here in Baton Rouge, we have a bunch of great Lebanese/Greek restaurants. They serve Lebanese Iced Tea, which is just lightly sweetened tea with lemon and rosewater, and a few pine nuts sprinkled on top. Just a little dab of the rosewater will do ya.

Now, you can sip iced tea leisurely while sniffing luscious roses. In February. By a roaring fire. Looking at rose pictures in catalogs.

My family came to the U.S. from Syria, back in 1960 (I guess that makes me 2nd generation). Anyways, in the Middle East they throw a dash of rosewater in the desserts (like baklava). It's traditional, and a nice touch. A little bit (few drops) is great, but too much and it easily gets overpowering, doesn't taste very good.
I've had a few drops splashed on sherbert, that's always nice in the summer.
My dry cleaners are a lovely Armenian couple from Istanbul, Turkey. They gave me rose jam for a Christmas. It's wonderful, I have some left in the fridge.

Enjoy the smell of roses, all year!

What a lovely find,that rose water. I think you were right to splurge on that purchase, Ann.
My oldest son presented me with a jar of Rose hip jam, (imported from Poland, no less) as a birthday present this weekend. I was savoring that fragrance as I ate my jellied toast this morning. You're right: it's a very nice sniff in winter.
:-)

Anne

Hmmm, must smell good. Which rose did it remind you of?

Rose flavored Turkish Delight.

In Bulgaria there is rose jam, rose juice, rose water for use in desserts, rose lokum (turkish delight). Sometimes I even drink rose water, it is good for the skin. Lol. But if you are not used to it, it is like drinking strong perfume, one of my Japanese friends almost fainted after drinking it, I think Japanese people sense the smell stronger than europeans...

lol, I picked some up a couple years ago at a middle eastern market, I think I planned on using it when making some Greek pastries. But my bottle didn't smell as good as true roses, it was kind of a weird scent. Must be some brands are better than others.

What a great idea, I will have to keep my eyes open for some Rose Water.

My cheap Rose thrill to get through winter this year was an experiment. I was at Wallyworld to restock the seed starting stuff very early in Jan and they had a bunch of the micro minis (same as the one's you see in grocery stores) for 1.87 each. I knew I had some time before starting any seeds and winter was making me nuts, so I bought 5, one of each colour they had.

First I divided & repotted which gave me 18. Then I took cuttings and 20 of those took & are now growing like crazy. In the basement under grow lights I have a little rose farm. The ones that were divided are covered in buds and will bloom shortly.

It's not the same as playing outside, but it helps.

Cathy

There's a gelato place in town with a huge variety of flavors. One of the flavors is Rose, and they also have Violet. It tastes like eating perfume. I've decided that I'd rather smell roses than taste them.

I will have to keep an eye out for that.

In the dead of winter that's a cheap price to pay for the scent of real rose.

I remember in the 50's my mother used to keep a bottle of Glycerin and Rosewater.

I was just looking at rose pictures from last year, I'd almost forgotten how beautiful they can be. That, and I have a couple seedlings getting their first set of green leaves, is helping me get through the dark time.

Here too, we use roses in candies and cakes ... The OGR "Rose de Provins" originally was grown in Provins to make perfumes and drugs but also marmelade and candies ...

An easy-to-do and yummy dessert is rose flavoured whipped cream with fresh raspberries and meringues :-P

What is true is that you must use only a few drops of rose water or it will taste like perfume ...

Barthelemy

Barthelemy
Marmelade.....please tell me more.
This past fall I gathered the last fragrant red blooms just before a serious freeze and made a jam of the rose petals. To get two pounds of petals, it took almost three gallons of loosely packed blooms.
Is the Rose de Provins a semidouble rose or is it more heavily petaled? (I can see collecting Damasks, but my Rosa Gallica has a low petal count and the quantity of bloms to make an ounce of petals....)

Your dessert will have to wait until wild black raspberry season. Do you use vanilla in the meringues? or rose water?

Ann,

I've never made rose marmelade myself, I purchase it ! (I live 30 miles away from Provins) ... I only have a small patio garden, hence it would be difficult for me to get enough petals, as you pointed it :D ...
Honestly, I've never asked if they still use Rosa Gallica Officinalis or if they have switched to more heavily petaled varieties ... I will ask next time I go there !

Regarding meringues, I use vanilla when I cook them myself ...
I believe that it would be difficult to get the freshness of the rose flavour in meringues, but I've never tried !
I sometimes use rose flavored "macarons" instead of meringues ("macarons" ressemble meringue, but with almond powder added in the recipe, filled with cream, marmelade or jelly) which are exquisite, but the rose flavour comes from the creamy filling.

Here is a link that might be useful: Macarons

A freind took me to an Indian grocery to buy spices,and she pointed out a very good brand of rose water from India, I bought a bottle and it is superb. The ingrediants are all natural and include
r. centifolia
r. damascena
and r. alba. It was only c. 3 bucks for 6 ounces. I've been using it as a room spray, which makes my bedroom smell like unto a bower of Old Garden Roses. An inexpensive and luxerious thrill.

Luxrosa

I will keep that in mind. Next time I find myself conversing with an Indian I will ask about that. OH I KNOW!! I will call my Dell Computer Support Line! I called them last week and was talking to a nice man in Southern India where it was in the 60's there and 16 degrees below freezing here and snowstorming. He called his temperature 'quite cool'.

I found a rose-scented massage oil called "Aura Glow" in a health food store here. A friend told me to massage whatever was sore at the end of a long day in the garden. Knees, feet, hands, you name it! By the end of the week my sheets smell so good I hate to wash them. I love rose water & will remember the import foodstore trick. Never thoughta that!

Yankee Candles' "Roses of Cliffwalk". They don't always carry it. I usually find it when they have a "return of the classics" or something like that. OGR fragrance - I keep trying to identify the rose......

I'd like to find some good rosewater to spritz on the sheets. Spritz the sheets - pile up in bed with a glass of wine, a bit of cheese, a bit of chocolate and all the rose porn.

Sprinkle a few drops of the rose water in between the pages of your catalogue. Now, that will help you empty your bank account real quick.

Now you've done it Ann. Gone and brightened up my day again. Here's the story. I drive the country lanes to work because I can't drive fast enough to keep these leadfoots happy anymore.
So off I go to work today. We're having a Chinook but there's a snowstorm behind it. The wind's howling and drifting the roads.
All the roads are wet and there's snow blowing over it, causing some nasty roads. I get to my last country lane which is never plowed. I have spent the winter getting it into fine driving condition with my Honda CRV.
It was gone. I drove a little way in and thought, no use. So I attempted to back out. Screwed up and ended in a snow bank.
Two dudes were out cruising on the nice highway located nearby and pulled in. They had a truck with a flatbed hooked up to it and a winch.
They got stuck, too but managed to pull ahead and hook on. They pulled me out. I sezz, "You boys each have a twenty and go to lunch on me."(They had the company truck. Boss never knew what hit him.)
"Now, Ma'am, (they call you ma'am so you don't think they are rapists) just back up straight over the railroad track and you'll be fine."
Off I went. Made it over the railroad track and went in again.
This time, their truck was stuck, so they came over and pushed me by hand. No use. "Ma'am, if you let me drive I'll just four -wheel you on out of here."
At this point I'll take anything. In he jumped and out I went.
"So, I said, "Are you guys going to be able to get out?'
They laughed. "Sure we will."
I left them there, studying this big old truck. It was a baby semi.
I went out the highway and drove on into town with my own little convoy trailing behind me.
Round two: Lately I have been planning a You-Tube video called "Nothing wrong with these roads, Luanne." It may be interfering with my concentration. I get home and hit the driveway. Ended up sitting in the middle of Halley's Roses.
Hubby comes home and pulls me into the culvert. I step out and and fall in. He pulls me out.
He sez, "I'll wait til Pat gets home."
Then I went in the house and my daughter called. "Momm, she says self-righteously, "There's a time when we all have to admit we can't drive anymore."
I pulled three children out of a snowbank this week. My driving skills are superb when I'm getting THEM out.
So out they went when Pat got home. "Mom," he sez,"That was easy."

I lived with someone from the Middle East who made a wonderfully refreshing summer drink by soaking a block of dried tamarind (you can also buy it at ethnic groceries) in a pitcher of cold water overnight and straining out most of the pulp, then adding just a little rose water.

I like making a really nice, inexpensive aftershave by adding a healthy dribble of rose water to witch hazel skin toner. It also feels great on the skin on a hot day and helps tighten up pores.

Sometime in the '60s, I was given a gift of a Cookie Cook Book. It had, among other wonderful delights, a recipe for Rose Cookies. They were shaped a bit like rose buds, looked like a sugar cookie, and had been lightly sprinkled with pinkish red sugar. And, included in the ingredients, was ROSE WATER. If I had known where to get any, I would have made those cookies, because they rang a bell with me - I'm sure I had some once when I was a child, and loved them. And THAT event would have been in the '30s...

I was so starved for the sight and smell of a rose the other day that I stood in front of a huge display at Costco of roses of every color and stuck my nose in every single bloom. No fragrance, none, nada. What a disappointment. Wish they produced florist roses with some scent. The rose water sounds perfect and now I have to figure out if there is any place to find some in my area.

Carol

wonderful story, kaylah!
brought a smile (grin?) to my typically dull early-morning face!

In the 60's, Avon had a great scent called Roses Roses;
you could get it in lotion, cologne, all kinds of products.

And more recently Yardley had "Red Roses" hard milled bath soap. But once Yardley started being available in oatmeal and lavender (not together) bath bars at a local pharmacy chain, Red Roses didn't seem to be around anymore.

A friend stopped by yesterday (this is almost newsworthy as we are so out in the country) and I got the rosewater out of the refrigerator. It even smelled great COLD!

One of the reasons I had avoided this sort of thing was a program given at our rose society about a decade ago about potpourii. The ladies dried petals (sharp modern yellows dried truest to color) and had no scent in the dried petals so they added "Rose oils". Their rose oils were from the crafts store and may have been totally artificial. But they overadded and the scent was gagging. Rose water though is like sticking my nose in a big ole' fragrant HP. Or Damask.

I always keep a bottle of rose water next to my ironing board to mix with the sprinkling water when I iron my own clothes and handkerchiefs and also when I iron pillow cases. I once used it in the water compartment of the steam iron itself but it was not a good idea.