- Granita
Granita (in Italian also granita siciliana) is a semi-frozen dessert of sugar, water, and flavorings originally from
Sicily , although available all overItaly . Related tosorbet anditalian ice , in most of Sicily it has a coarser, more crystalline texture. Food writerJeffrey Steingarten says that "the desired texture seems to vary from city to city" on the island; on the west coast and inPalermo , it is at its chunkiest, and in the east it is nearly as smooth as sorbet. (Steingarten 371) This is largely the result of different freezing techniques: the smoother types are produced in a gelato machine, while the coarser varieties are frozen with only occasional agitation, then scraped or shaved to produce separated crystals.Common and traditional flavoring ingredients include
lemon juice,mandarin orange s,jasmine ,coffee ,almond s, mint, and when in season wild strawberries and black mulberries.Chocolate granitas have a tradition in the city ofCatania and, according to Steingarten, nowhere else in Sicily. The nuances of the Sicilian ingredients are important to the flavor of the finished granita: Sicilian lemons are a less acidic, more floral variety similar toMeyer lemon s, while the almonds used contain some number of bitter almonds, crucial to the signature almond flavor.Granita with coffee is very common in the city of
Messina , while granita with almonds is popular in the city of Catania. Granita in combination with a yeast pastry called "brioche " is a common breakfast in summer time. (The Sicilian brioche is generally flatter and wider than the French version.)Granita is often found served as a slush-type drink rather than a dessert, in a paper or plastic cup with a plastic lid and a straw (often a spoon straw).
References
*cite book|author=Steingarten, Jeffrey|title=The Man Who Ate Everything|chapter=The Mother of All Ice Cream|pages=361–380|year=1997|publisher=Vintage Books|id=ISBN 0-375-70202-4 The chapter is an essay first published in June 1996.
See also
*
Italian ice
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