SC - Unusual beverage

[Stefan li Rous]

Greetings,

Last weekend when we were exploring an oriental food store, I found and
bought a bag of what look like dried flowers.

The name on the bag is "Flor de Jamaica" and the brand is "Lopez Bros.
& co.".  They look like some sort of very dark red/purple flower petals, 
most about an inch long and a quarter wide, rather curled. There are
some whitish or partial white petals mixed in.

The directions to use them are:
For 3 quarts
1) Use 12 cups of water.
2) Add 1 1/2 cups of Jamaica.
3) Rinse then boil Jamaica until water is dark red.
4) Strain, then add sugar to taste.
5) Serve cold.

And that's it. So does anyone have any idea what this stuff is? With
the name, I would assume it is a New World item, probably first found
on the Island of Jamaica.

At least this package had some words in English text. I skipped a lot
of other items because I had no idea how they were supposed to be used
since there were no directions and sometimes even no text in English.
I opened the package and while there is a "fruity" smell that I can't
immediately identify when I taste a petal I don't get any obvious
taste.

Yes, this sounds like a Hispanic item. The company is in Mission, TX.
The Lopez Bros. label has a guy in a big sombrero next to a cactus.
Umm. ok. It does say "Product of Mexico". There is no ingredient list.
Why this was in an Oriental grocery store, I'm not sure.

- -- 
THLord  Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
Mark S. Harris             Austin, Texas         stefan at texas.net
**** See Stefan's Florilegium files at:  http://www.florilegium.org ****