Making rosehip syrup with eight year olds from Wallands School

The Lottie project asked me to join in with one of their school parties for a Herbal medicine making session. What a treat it was, i loved working with the children. Every other week a group of 12 children visit the community allotment in Lewes run by Sarah Rideout and Tanya Lewis, to grow some fruit and veg and often to harvest and cook themselves lunch. Their organisation Common Cause promotes gardening and growing locally.
This is the season of berries, bright and alluring to children, but often children are nowadays taught that all wild berries are poisonous. It was good to teach their benefits. I brought some Thyme from my garden, Some Liquorice from my dispensary and after putting the Liquorice on to simmer we went of to collect Rose hips together. This was a fun part of the morning and gave the children real ownership of the finished product. Rose hips were collected in WWII in their tonnes to provide English children with Vitamin C when supplies of oranges couldn't get here. They contain the highest concentration of Vit. C of any (certainly indigenous) fruit.
I think that its really important that children are taught sometimes by non teachers as i don't have to conform to any "standard practices " or education agendas. We took the hips back to the camp kitchen and i smashed the hips up in a tea towel between rocks before putting them into the Liquorice brew. They had 15 minutes simmering gently and the Thyme went in for the last five minutes of this. The whole brew was poured into a muslin bag and pressed through the press you can see. Though not strictly necessary, i thought the children would like to use some machinery, and the press added to the theatre of the event. Everyone had a spin of the press, and the resulting decoction was returned to the clean pan and sugar added. Three kilos of sugar added to 2 Litres of decoction. Yes its a lot of sugar, some people use a ratio of 1:1, some 2:1 sugar:liquid, mine was in between. I didn't want their syrups to go mouldy. When the sugar had melted the syrup was poured into sterilised bottles , labelled by the children, so they could take it home. A certificate of excellence in potion making was awarded to each child.