Strawberry Limeade Granita

Strawberry Limeade Granita

I was looking for a way to use up 4 oz of mascarpone cheese I had left over from when I made our most delicious Mocha Chocolate Chip Icebox Cake. I found this recipe for a Strawberry Mascarpone granita, so I put my own spin on it with things I already had. It was DELICIOUS! I would definite make it again. It was also pretty cheap to make (REALLY cheap if you use cream cheese bought on sale instead,) and with the price of ice cream, I'm glad to have an alternative! If you buy all of the ingredients for this recipe on sale, you can easily make an entire batch for $3 or so.

Adapted from www.foodtv.com,

Ingredients

• 1 cup water 
• Zest of 1 lime
• 1/2 cup sugar, plus 1 tablespoon
• 2 cups chopped strawberries
• 1/2 cup mascarpone cheese (could sub cream cheese or greek yogurt)
• Juice of 1 lime
• Pinch of salt

Directions

Place the water, 1/2 sugar cup, and lime zest in a small pan and bring to a simmer, stirring occasionally to help dissolve the sugar. Let simmer over low heat to steep the lime zest. Then strain the lime zest from the simple syrup. (I carefully peeled the zest off with a vegetable peeler, so I just pulled my zest pieces out with tongs.) Discard the lime zest.

In a food processor or blender combine 2 cups of strawberries with the remaining 1 tablespoon of sugar and the juice of one lime. Run the machine to puree the strawberries. Add the mascarpone cheese and salt. Run the machine until the mascarpone cheese is fully incorporated. Add the lime simple syrup and run the machine to combine. Place the strawberry mixture in an 8 by 8-inch glass dish and place the dish in the freezer. The mixture will take about 4 hours to freeze.

To serve, use a fork to scrape the granita. Spoon the mixture into chilled bowls. Serve immediately.