Rhubarb and Strawberry Sorbet :: A Recipe ::

For Easter weekend we headed down to Johnny's grandparents house, which has become so much of a tradition, Milo considers this trip 'going to Easter'.  Whilst there, among all the many wonderful dishes and copious amounts of chocolate on offer, we sampled some rhubarb sorbet, created by Johnny's Grandpa.  I couldn't believe how delicious it was.  It had such a sweet flavour that I can't quite put my finger on, but ever since then I've been dreaming of attempting my own version.

So when my lovely next door neighbour presented me with 2 sticks of rhubarb last week,  it seemed like the perfect time to have a go, I already had half a punnet of strawberries sitting in my fridge, so I figured this classic combination seemed too good to miss.

I'm so pleased with how this turned out, adding the strawberries really brings it together I think. I'm especially grateful for this taste of summer on a dull, grey, rainy day like today! 

I don't have an ice cream machine, so this recipe assumes you don't either, though if you do I'm sure it's fairly simple to make that work too.

Ingredients ::

500g Rhubarb (this was 2 big sticks for me)

150g Strawberries

225g Caster Sugar

150ml Water

Method ::

Wash and slice the rhubarb into 2cm chunks.

Wash and hull the strawberries, slicing in half.

Cook the rhubarb with the water on a medium heat on the hob for around 5 mins.  This just gives the rhubarb a bit of head start on the strawberries, which will take a lot less time to soften

Add the strawberries and the sugar, cooking for a further 10 mins, until everything is nice and soft and easy to squish.

Leave to cool for around 5-10 mins.

Blend until smooth. I used a stick blender for this, but do make sure you've allowed the mixture to cool before doing this, you do not want boiling hot fruit leaping out of the pan at you (trust me, I learned this the hard way!).  Any kind of blender will work fine.

Create an ice bath.  Use a container larger than the one you intend to use for the freezing of your sorbet and fill with ice, then transfer your mixture to the smaller container and put this into the ice container.

Leave until cool enough to move to the freezer.

Once in the freezer, return to your sorbet after 45 mins to give it a good mix up.  I tend to use a combination of a wooden spoon and whisk for this job.  I use the spoon to get all the mixture off the sides of the container and break it up, then the whisk to give it a good mix up.

Repeat this 'mixing up' every 30 mins until completely frozen, I probably mixed mine about 4/5 times before it reached this stage.

Transfer to an air tight container to store.

Enjoy!