Here Is How Water and Sugar Are Turned into Delicious, Creamy Sorbet (2024)

FAQs

What makes a sorbet creamy? ›

Without fat from dairy or eggs, it's the suspension of sugar within the fruit purée that allows the sorbet to churn into something with a creamy mouthfeel. You need 20-30% sugar in your sorbet, which will come from your fruit plus some added sugar.

Making Perfectly Smooth Sorbet

Too little sugar and the sorbet becomes icy, too much and it can be slushy — hit the sugar level just right and the sorbet will taste creamy and melt evenly across your tongue. There's a very simple way to tell if your sugar levels are right: Float a large egg in the sorbet base.

The Master Ratio

If you don't know the exact sugar content of your fruit, the best thing you can do is play it safe. A sugar concentration between 20% to 30% will generally produce a scoopable, creamy sorbet. * Add less and your sorbet is too icy to scoop; add more and it may never freeze.

Alcohol reduces the mixture's freezing point, thus making the sorbet softer and easier to scoop. And the more alcohol you add, the softer the sorbet gets, until you add so much that the mixture's freezing point is literally too cold to freeze in a conventional freezer.

What exactly is sorbet? Sorbet is a frozen dessert made primarily of fruit puree, water, and sweeteners.

So, while they may be a better option than a thick slice of cake or a fried dessert, you should stick to one serving size and look for lower sugar varieties when possible. "While both sherbet and sorbet are naturally high in added sugars, the biggest difference is the addition of dairy or not," she says.

Sorbet has less calories than ice cream and other frozen desserts, and no fat. It's fruit content also makes it rich in vitamin C. Any downsides? That fruit content also means it contains a fair bit of sugar, and if we're comparing it with ice cream and gelato, it has less calcium, vitamin A and iron.

Just puree the fruit, add some honey, chill, then freeze. Um, okaaay. Needless to say, I'll be making homemade sorbet from here on out, and I don't think I'll ever even miss the sugar.

Too little sweetener and your sorbet will be icy; too much sweetener and it will be mushy. Churn or stir your sorbet while it's freezing to prevent large ice crystals from forming. Please note the “Easy (no keep)” method doesn't require any sweetener or churning/stirring.

From a food blog: I often use egg whites to emulsify (smooth) my sorbets. I have also used lecithin and xanthan gum to great success when trying to not add extra liquid or worrying about someone who is allergic to egg whites. So it seems it makes ice cream creamy.

What can I use to stabilize my sorbet? ›

The egg test: Clean an egg well in water. Dry it and place it into your sorbet mixture - the egg should float and the tip should stick out about the size of a dime. If it is more than a dime - there is too much sugar.

The two most common ingredients in cooking that affect freezing point are salt and sugar. Sugar lowers the freezing point of water, which makes frozen desserts fair game for changes in freezing point. Most desserts freeze between 29.5 to 26.6 degrees F (-1.4 to -3.0 C) depending on the concentration of sugar.

Sorbet recipes often call for alcohol, sometimes as little as a tablespoon, to improve texture. Alcohol reduces a sorbet base's freezing point, thus making the sorbet softer and easier to scoop.

Frozen water (ice) is a regular array of molecules. Sugar molecules don't fit well in that array. So when you freeze sugar water or juice, the sugar stays behind in the liquid water as the ice forms.

Make sure that you puree well. Too cold a freezer: sorbet is going to be best if it's not frozen extremely cold, but your freezer probably is nice and cold. Be willing to let it sit out a little bit before eating, or and perhaps keep it in the door where it's slightly warmer.

Sorbet has just two main ingredients: fruit and sugar. There may also be some water, flavorings, or acid added to it, but it's essentially blended fruit that's churned and then frozen. No dairy is added to sorbet, which is how it is different from ice cream.

The optional egg white helps to stabilize, emulsify, and preserve the texture of the sorbet if you are going to keep it in your freezer for a few days.