gin tonic sorbet

Spring is finally here, and as the summer girl I am, I’m thinking ahead and getting excited about long evenings on the balcony, concerts with my friend Sofia (well, okay, maybe not this year) and hot days at the beach.

Do you want to know the truth? I won’t give a damn if I will have to wait for it a little while longer. As every year, I’ll run outside in cute sandals way too early, leave umbrellas all over the London Underground and will forget my bright yellow rain coat at work although it’s pretty much the brightest colour any raincoat designer could think of. I love summer. I’m ready for it, no matter the weather conditions.

As I told you already, I love Gin Tonic, probably more than the Queen does. Of course that is until proven otherwise.

In fact, since I drink alcohol, I think Gin Tonic is pretty much my number one drink.

Of course ten, twelve, mumblemumble years ago in Germany all you could get was Gordon’s, or if you were especially fancy, Bombay Sapphire. Until my 21st birthday I never had an outstanding gin – then someone bought me a bottle of Monkey 47. (Although I mention brands, I’m not sponsored by anyone, #advertisement)

Monkey 47 in my opinion tastes like standing on a meadow on a mild summer evening and inhaling those smells of warmth, dry grass and wild flowers. With gin. It’s to this day one of my favourite gins and I recommend it to anyone.

This Gin Tonic Sorbet I created for a photo shoot as you can see, and it’s super easy.

You will need (2 portions):

100 ml gin of your choice, but as recommended above Monkey 47; 400ml tonic water of your choice (I tend to use Fever Tree), 2 tablespoons of sugar, 70ml of water, a lime and szechuan pepper as garnish. 

Here is how to prepare your sorbet: Mix the sugar with the water and bring to a simmer until it turns to a sugar syrup. Add a bit of lime zest and the juice of half a lime.

Mix the gin with the tonic and add 2-3 tablespoons of your lime-syrup. If you have more of a sweet tooth, you can add everything. Don’t use more gin than indicated in the recipe, since it will not freeze properly and taste only of alcohol. Yes, I’ve learned the hard way.

If you own an icecream maker, just fill in the mix and follow the instructions of the machine, if you don’t, fill the mixture into a high plastic box or bowl and stick into the chest freezer.

This will take about 6-8 hours to freeze completely (if you only have a small frigde-freezer probably longer), blend the mixture with a stick blender every two hours to avoid a grainy structure and put back into the freezer as soon as possible.

Once its frozen completely, blend again so you have a smooth sorbet and garnish with the szechuan pepper.

A word to the szechuan pepper: It’s a great, great pepper from the Szechuan Province in China. It’s not very hot, but it has a lemony flavour and it opens up your taste buds and enhances your salvia production. Sounds a bit gross, but it’s more like sherbert and makes your mouth a bit tingly.

Enjoy your sorbet and remember: We’ve been waiting long, but summer is coming.