Pear sorbet, and other frozen delights

You might remember a post I wrote quite a few months ago, on mulled wine granita. Well, this week I’ve revisited the wonderful world of frozen desserts: I had to poach some pears the other day (for more on that, you’ll have to see November’s issue of The Field) and ended up with rather a lot of leftover pear-flavoured syrup. Pear sorbet was pretty much the first thing that sprang to mind. You don’t have to use pear syrup for the recipe below, but if you’ve poached a few pears (as we all do once in a while...) and happen to have some hanging around, sorbet is a great way to use it up.

Some history and definition

Supposedly invented by the Romans (there’s a lovely story about the Emperor Nero having buckets of ice passed by hand along the Appian Way to his banqueting tables, where it was mixed with honey and wine), sorbet came to Britain via Italy and France in the late 17^th century. It’s made from sugar syrup, fruit puree and often contains alcohol as well (woop woop). It’s distinct from ice cream because it contains no dairy products, and from granita because of its smaller ice crystals, which give it a smoother texture.

The science bit

When water freezes, it forms one solid mass of ice crystals – like an ice cube, for example. Sorbet and ice cream are both water-based (which is why they freeze) but in order for them to freeze into a lovely scoop-able softness, you need to add other ingredients to the water. This reduces the freezing point of the mixture so it doesn’t set as hard, and it then needs to be churned as it freezes to break up the ice crystals, which gives a smoother texture and again stops it from freezing solid. In the case of ice cream the addition is a diary-based product like cream or custard, but with sorbet fruit purée and sugar syrup are used. Alcohol also helps to lower the freezing point.

Unlike ice cream, sorbet doesn’t need to be constantly churned as it freezes (although you can make it in your ice cream maker if you have one) – you just have to give it a good stir with a fork every half an hour. This makes it an easy option for those of us who are still waiting for that state-of-the-art ice cream machine to appear in our Christmas stocking - all you need is a pan, a sieve and a Tupperware (much cheaper...)

Variations

Since it’s based on fruit purée and sugar syrup, sorbet is open to a whole variety of variations. You can vary the purée itself or mix two or three different types of fruit, not to mention the variety of alcohols and flavoured syrups at your disposal. I talked a bit about flavoured syrups in my blog on lemonade, and the ones you use for sorbets are no different.

You can infuse a huge variety of flavours into a syrup just by adding a herb or spice and heating it through: so, for example, to make rosemary syrup you mix add equal quantities by volume of sugar and water, throw in a couple of sprigs of rosemary, then bring it briefly to a boil, cool, and strain. Rosemary syrup goes well with pear purée in a sorbet.

You could also try strawberry sorbet with basil syrup or black pepper syrup, or raspberry sorbet made with cassis or with mint syrup. Apple and mint sorbet is pretty refreshing, and if you use rum as the alcohol element you’ve pretty much got apple mojito sorbet. In fact, a lot of cocktail flavour combinations work well as sorbets, so you can pretty much pick your favourite cocktail and adapt it to make a sorbet recipe. As usual, get creative!

One last note

Just out of pure interest, there’s an awesome machine called a pacojet which you can read about here (no, they are not paying me...but they probably should be). You can literally put whole pieces of fruit and sugar syrup in, freeze them, and it micropurées them to make a perfect, fresh sorbet without even needing to cook the fruit. And you can do it with meat to make perfectly smooth patés and make sauces without ever needing to defrost the ingredients. How cool is that? If I had £5,000, I’d be sorely tempted.

And without further expensive distraction, on to a recipe: simple pear sorbet with vodka (or calvados). Enjoy!

Pear Sorbet with Vodka or Calvados

Ingredients

1kg pears, as ripe as you can get

200g sugar

200ml water

65ml vodka or calvados (apple brandy)

Method

Peel and quarter the pears (you don’t need to worry about coring them though). Put the sugar and water in a large pan and stir over a fairly gentle heat until all the sugar has dissolved. Add the pears and bring to a boil. Simmer until the pears are so soft they’re falling apart. If they don’t fall apart by themselves after half an hour or so, you can give them a hand with a liquidiser!

Push the pear mush through a fine sieve to remove any pieces of core or pips. You’ll probably have to push it through with a spoon and it might take a little while, but I prefer doing this to having to core the pears beforehand – you’ll have to sieve it either way, so why make extra work for yourself?

Once it’s all been through the sieve, you just need to mix in the vodka or calvados, then pop it in a freezer-proof container, cover it (clingfilm is fine) then put it in the freezer and give it a good mix with a fork every half an hour.

It might seem like nothing’s happening for the first hour or so, but eventually it’ll start to freeze around the edges. Just keep mixing every half an hour to break up the ice crystals, and eventually it will be frozen all the way through. It’s best served within a couple of days of making it, otherwise the crystals start to get big again. It’ll keep for a week or so in the freezer.

Nostalgic Banoffee Pie

Well hello all! It’s been quite a gap since I last posted, for which many apologies: I’ve been sorting things out around my column and my ever-increasing array of part-time jobs!

One of the only things I’ve managed to cook outside my column and catering jobs in the last couple of months has been banoffee pie, that delicious (and rather addictive) blend of toffee, banana and whipped cream. There’s not a huge amount to say about it: banoffee is a compound word reflecting the dessert’s two main ingredients, and it’s supposed to have been invented at The Hungry Monk restaurant in the 1970s. Since then, though, it’s become a British classic, beloved of Mums everywhere for its easy method and popularity with the younger generation.

My banoffee pie uses a crushed biscuit base – for which I apologise to the original creators, who were apparently pastry purists. You can use either, but I prefer the biscuit base because it’s easier to make and I like the flavour combination with the banana and toffee. If you do want to use pastry, just blind-bake a sweet pastry base (you can easily find a recipe on the internet) then build the rest of the pie as described below.

I made my pie for one of my housemates – it’s her favourite dessert, and I have to say it’s probably one of mine as well. It’s unbelievably easy to make, and for me is always rather nostalgic too – the pudding of childhood parties or special occasions.

It also has more recent, painful associations, from when a friend and I were on a catering job a few years back and sharing the workload. One day it worked out that I did the starter and the main course and he did the pudding – and they’d asked for banoffee pie. He knocked one out pretty quickly while I worked away on the soufflés and full roast for the rest of the meal (uneven workloads? Maybe...) When the meal was over the client popped their head around the kitchen door to say that that was the best banoffee pie they’d ever had, ‘you should package and sell that stuff’. Did they mention my starter or main course? They did not.

Despite that crushing blow, I did steel myself to make another one, for my housemates’ sake. And here’s the recipe:

Ingredients

250g plain digestive biscuits

100g butter

2 small tins condensed milk

4 big bananas

A bit of lemon juice

1 pint double cream

1 tsp sugar

Small block of dark or milk chocolate for grating

Method

First of all, punch a hole in the top of each tin of condensed milk with a skewer. Put them into a saucepan of water so it nearly but not quite covers them. Simmer very gently for 2 ½ hours. When you open the tins the condensed milk should have turned to a dark golden-brown caramel. Alternatively, you can buy tins of ready-simmered condensed milk in the supermarket – it’s labelled ‘dulche de leche’, which is just another name for caramel made from condensed milk.

Melt the butter over a gentle heat and crush the digestive biscuits up really small (the best way is to seal them up in a large freezer bag and give them a good bash with a rolling pin). Mix the butter and crushed biscuits thoroughly and press the mixture into a large tartlet tin. Put it into the fridge – it will solidify as it cools.

Once the dulche de leche is ready and the base has cooled, slice the bananas to around 1cm thick and toss the slices in a little lemon juice to stop them browning. Pour the dulche de leche into a bowl and beat it until it’s smooth and even, then spread it evenly over the base. Cover this with a layer of sliced banana (place the slices on rather than pouring them over, so they form an even layer).

Finally, whip the double cream and spread it over the bananas, then grate over some chocolate to finish. Try not to eat it all at once!