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Ice Queens

Steeped in the splendor of herbs and flowers, sorbets lift our spirits

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BARRY WONG As refreshing as they are lovely to look at, rose-petal and wild-fennel sorbets make the perfect palate cleanser or light dessert.

IN AN EFFORT to explain the similarities between the spicy Mexican dishes known as "mole" and the family of spicy Indian stews known as curry, food historian Rachel Lauden has traced the roots of both to a common source, namely, "the cuisine of medieval Islam, a cuisine that was enjoyed from southern Spain in the west to northern India in the east."

Her article, "The Mexican Kitchen's Islamic Connection," which appeared online last summer in an issue of Saudi Aramco World, details convincingly how Spanish colonial cooking, which gave rise to mole in the convents of Puebla, was drawn from Moorish traditions, the same traditions that spawned curries in the East. The article also points out how Mexican aqua frescas, cool beverages flavored with fruit and flowers, are descended from Arabian sharbats, the sweet and sometimes frozen beverages that are the direct ancestors of our own familiar sorbets and sherbets.

When I started making my own sorbets and ices in the mid-1980s, I had some inkling of all this. I also had, by that time, dabbled enough in herbalism to recognize the potentially therapeutic effects of herb-flavored sorbets. So I set about making frozen desserts and palate cleansers with herbs and flowers.

Living in the last quarter of the 20th century, I had unprecedented access to information, ingredients and equipment that might allow me to do something really innovative. Armed with the knowledge that French sorbets were derived from Arabian ices, it occurred to me to try to make an Arabian rose-flavored ice, using the wild Nootka roses I found growing on San Juan Island where I lived. I also experimented with lavender flowers, cedar boughs, sage leaves, lemon balm and various other herbal and botanical flavorings. But, like so many chefs of my generation, I did not necessarily have the skills to bring my ideas to the fore.

I had good results with ice cream and fruit sorbets, but the water-based herbal and floral concoctions I came up with lacked substance. They were so light that their presence in the mouth was fleeting, and the flavor, while it was pleasant, evaporated almost as soon as the ice melted. My herbal sorbets were like sweetened, scented snowballs — light and dry or heavy and wet. I couldn't seem to get the right balance.

The breakthrough came from an unexpected place. Even as I was trying to achieve the perfect herbal sorbet, I was experimenting with herb- and flower-flavored jellies. For these, I used powdered pectin. A natural fiber derived from fruit, powdered pectin gave my herbal jellies the body they needed to set. Eventually, it dawned on me that the same pectin that made my jams and jellies set might give my sorbets the body they were lacking. So I combined these two branches of experimentation and voila! As soon as I added pectin, my frozen concoctions gained the lingering mouth feel that had been so wanting. Now they had the slow-melting quality of ice cream or a sorbet made with whole fruit.

These days, I sometimes want to make a botanical sorbet as a palate cleanser to serve between the seafood and meat courses of an important dinner. I start by making a strong "tea" out of the flavoring element, then I add sugar and, to balance the sweetness, a dash of lemon juice. When no one is looking, I stir in my secret ingredient, a box of powdered pectin. Finally, I freeze the mixture in an ice-cream maker.

Looking back, it seems that the emergence of these smooth herbal sorbets from a contemporary American kitchen was inevitable. Just like mole from Mexico and curry from the Punjab.

Greg Atkinson is a contributing editor for Food Arts magazine and a culinary consultant. He can be reached at greg@northwestessentials.com. Barry Wong is a Seattle-based free-lance photographer. He can be reached at barrywongphoto@earthlink.net.