mango sorbet

Hi, Grandma. It's me again. Grandma, do you remember when you gave me your ice cream maker a few years ago? That newer electric one that you never used? Well, I was awfully glad to receive it. I took it back to South Bend with me and tucked it away, waiting for an opportunity to use it (since ice cream makers aren't everyday electrics for the lactose intolerant). That opportunity didn't come while I lived there, so when it came time to move to Washington, I packed it up and brought it with me, certain that I would eventually have a chance to put it to use. Well, last week I got tired of waiting, so I decided to use it to make a sorbet instead (all the frozen goodness, no nasty side effects). A mango sorbet, in fact, since mangoes were on super sale at the grocery store. So I bought my mangoes and had everything ready to go, but when I pulled your ice cream maker out of the box, half the parts were missing! I guess that explains why you never used it.


After carting that thing all over the country, what could I do but laugh at the absurdity of it all? Well, laugh and buy my own ice cream maker, of course. So here is the mango sorbet recipe that has been a week in the making. The sorbet was fine, but as it turns out, I'm actually not a huge fan of mangoes. (Oh, the irony....) However, if you do like them and want to give this recipe a spin, here's what you should know: Unless you like your sorbets super sweet (as in, just this side of cloying), you'll want to take the sugar factor down a notch -- perhaps by substituting more lime juice for some of the simple syrup since, at only 3 tablespoons, the lime flavor isn't detectable in the final product anyway. Also, the recipe only made enough sorbet to fill four shell halves, but I'm not sure that serving the sorbet in the shells is a great idea anyway because it makes the serving size about three times larger than what the average person would actually want to eat.

Mango Sorbet
A recipe from Gourmet - July 1997
Makes 6 cups

4 ripe mangoes (about 3 1/2 pounds total)
1 cup water
1 cup sugar
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice, or to taste

In a saucepan bring sugar and water to a boil, stirring until sugar is completely dissolved. Cool completely. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use. (Syrup may be made up to 1 week ahead.)

Line a baking sheet with plastic wrap.

Wash and dry mangoes. Using a sharp knife, remove the 2 flat sides of each mango, cutting lengthwise alongside pit and cutting as close to pit as possible so that mango flesh is in 2 large pieces. With a spoon carefully scoop flesh from mango sides into a blender, leaving shells intact. With a knife cut remaining flesh from pit and add to blender. Add syrup and lime juice to blender and purée until smooth. Put mango shells on baking sheet and freeze while making sorbet.

Freeze mango purée in an ice-cream maker. Scoop sorbet into frozen shells, mounding slightly, and smooth surfaces. Freeze filled mango shells at least 6 hours, or until frozen hard. Frozen sorbets in shells may be wrapped individually in plastic wrap and kept in freezer 1 week.