Lemon and Basil Sorbet

Are you a fan of Italian ices?  When I lived in the Lehigh Valley in Pennsylvania, they called them water ices. Joe has been buying a lot of the lemon Italian ices from the supermarket, and I wondered about making something similar.  After two rounds of homemade ice cream recently, it sounded like a lighter and more refreshing option.  And not in that bland diet way.  These are wonderfully cold and lemony and won't weigh you down.

But I didn't want to do a plain lemon sorbet, and I remembered Kiersten from Oh My Veggies blogged a Meyer Lemon and Basil Sorbet a while back.  Alas, meyer lemons were in season when she blogged them in February but they aren't now, and I've never seen a meyer lemon sold around here.  But the sorbet still turned out awesome with ordinary lemons.  I was afraid when making the simple syrup that it smelled too strongly of basil, but when tasting the sorbet it truly was the perfect amount of the herb.  It doesn't overpower the lemon at all but enhances it, and while the basil definitely has a presence I wonder if others could guess what it is.

And Joe?  He went nuts for the sorbet.  It costs just a little more to make the homemade sorbet rather than buying the Italian ices -- luckily I plucked all the basil off my front porch -- but the sorbet was way better.  I can't say I'll be replacing his Italian ice fix with homemade sorbet a few times a week, but it will make an appearance a few more times this summer.

Click here to visit Oh My Veggies for the recipe.

Update: This post made the Foodbuzz Top 9.  Thanks for all the buzz!