| Hibiscus blossoms as a food, drink ingredient Chefs attracted to hibiscus’ deep color and floral aroma
By PAMELA
PARSEGHIAN
Tampa, Fla.-based chain The Melting Pot also offers a Champagne-based cocktail with a whole candied hibiscus and touch of sugar syrup for special events like New Year’s Eve and Valentine’s Day. During those promotions, four-to-six-course menus with the specialty drink are priced from $80 to $125, which varies because 141 of the chain’s 145 stores are franchised and the menu and pricing ultimately are determined by the franchisee. Still the operators often elect to serve the drink. “There is a lot of enthusiasm surrounding these flowers,” says Shane Schaibly, Melting Pot’s manager of culinary development. The hibiscus “really adds the ‘wow’ factor.” “They have a very, very beautiful, magical deep red color that is deeper red than cranberry,” says chef John Gray, of restaurant John Gray Downtown in Cancún, Mexico. He buys dry hibiscus from central Mexico and parts of the Yucatan Peninsula where hibiscus tea is a traditional beverage, and infuses vodka with the flowers. “It has a bit of bitterness to it,” he adds, “almost like cranberry does.” To control the bitterness, he strains the flower out after one night. He adds approximately 7 ounces of the petals to a liter of alcohol. He mixes hibiscus vodka with cranberry juice and orange liqueur, and tops it with a twist of lime for the Martini de Flor de Jamaica, a Cosmopolitan-like cocktail that can be served straight up or on the rocks for about $10, he says. The Chicago Tribune recently called hibiscus the next “in” ingredient, noting that it’s tart taste and rich color mean it may follow in the footsteps of the previously popular cranberry and pomegranate. Hibiscus is called jamaica in Mexico and goes by other names in other languages. There are hundreds of kinds of hibiscus that vary in color and size. Most varieties are edible. But it might not be a good idea to cook up any type growing in a garden. They are related to rose of Sharon and okra, which has a small blossom that is shaped like a hibiscus and varies in color. “I try to not get worked up about the look of a plate, but it’s important that it comes to the table looking pretty,” says chef Peter Kelly, who garnishes a crisp sweetbread dish with the whole candied flower as well as wild huckleberries, frisée and green-peppercorn dust. That appetizer sells for $13.50 at X20 Xaviars on the Hudson in Yonkers, N.Y. “Hibiscus is unusual,” but most anyone who orders sweetbreads already has an adventurous palate, Kelly says. “There is a lot of intrigue with hibiscus,” he says. “It even cures illnesses.” In fact, a study of the flower’s health benefits has just been accepted for publication in a health journal. The double-blind, placebo-controlled study found three cups of hibiscus tea a day “significantly” lowered blood pressure, according to Dr. Diane McKay, a scientist studying antioxidants, and her fellow scholars at Tufts University. Men’s Health magazine has also cited data indicating that hibiscus tea lowers blood pressure. Still, McKay says, hibiscus’ heath benefits are nothing new. It’s just the first time they has been documented by U.S. experts. For hundreds of years hibiscus has been “consumed worldwide—from the Middle East to Europe to Thailand,” she says.—pparsegh@nrn.com | 
