Watermelon Granita
Hola, are we ready for the weekend?
I know I am! Well, I still have one more day of work to get by, but right after that, I’m ready! Oh that doesn’t sound as exciting now (facepalm). Anyhow, speaking of exciting things, I have an incredibly easy recipe for you. Like probably the easiest you’ll ever make. It’s 3 ingredients and you only need 10 minutes to make it. But, that’s not even the most exciting part. The most exciting part is that it’s f*cking delicious (pardon my French) and super refreshing- perfect for warm summer days! Plus, I also have a neat trick for you on how you can make it even better. I mean, if that’s not a win-win, I don’t know what is!
What’s a granita, you ask? Let me tell you.
Granita is basically a semi-frozen Italian dessert that’s kinda like shaved ice in texture. It’s made with water, sugar and a flavouring of your choice, a.k.a one of the most versatile desserts there is. So if you have some sugar, some water, some sort of fruit with you and you have a freezer, you can make this dessert with NO prior knowledge of pastry whatsoever. And you really can’t mess it up. Like it is super hard to do that. Now, there are lot of opinions around as to what is the right texture for a granita? Is it meant to be icy, or grainy or smooth? Personally, I like mine slightly grainy because of the texture, but if you prefer a smoother granita, all you need to do is increase the sugar slightly.
While there isn’t much science to this, let’s dig into the basic science of granitas. #NerdAlert: the texture of your granita depends on the ratio of your ingredients. Usually, the standard formula is 8 parts of fruit (or vegetable if you want to be creative), 1 part of sugar and 1 part of citrus (lemon, lime, alcohol works too). Depending on the sweetness of your fruit, this will obviously change. Sugar plays a key role in granita. The texture of your granita depends on the ratio of sugar in the recipe. So, if you want a slightly smoother granita, you can increase the sugar as sugar reduces the freezing point of water, therefore, it is going to be less icy. Just be careful in increasing the sugar as you don’t want to make it too sugary that you end up masking the original flavour of the fruit.
For this recipe, the ratio of fruit to sugar is much higher because watermelons are naturally quite sweet so I didn’t want to mask the flavour of watermelons with too much sugar. You won’t have to worry about the ratios here because I have done the work for you. You can sit back, make yourself some granita, maybe add some prosecco? (it is the weekend after all!) and enjoy. You’re welcome! Happy baking you guys and happy weekend! xx
Recipe
Serves: 6
Ingredients
560g watermelon juice, (roughly 725g of watermelon chunks)
30g lemon juice
40g castor sugar
40g water
mint leaves, for garnish
Prosecco or sparkling rośe, optional
Method
Make a simple syrup: Put the sugar and water in a small saucepan and heat until the sugar has dissolved completely. Remove from heat and keep aside to cool down.
Meanwhile, in a bowl, strain the watermelon and lemon juice. Add the cooled simple syrup and mix well.
Transfer the granita mix to a metal baking tray and freeze overnight.
Once completely frozen, use a fork and scrape the granita to break up the ice crystals. Serve in frozen glasses with a mint garnish.
Pro tip: Pour some prosecco or sparkling rośe over the granita for an easy cocktail fix. A simple measurement would be 75g of granita with 60ml of prosecco or rośe.
Notes:
Ensure your baking tray isn’t too big for the granita mix or else you’ll end up with a very thin layer of granita which won’t scrape nicely and will become super icy.
If you enjoyed that and tried it at home, please tag me at @myyummyspatula on Instagram so that I can see all your bakes! For more BTS stories, updates and fun, you can follow long here:
