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Lychee and Coconut Sorbet


June is clearly a month with a problem of plenty. All the good fruits - cherries, apricots, peaches, lychees and green almonds - descend in the markets at approximately the same time. And don't forget all the different varieties of mangoes. Every time I go to fruit market from end of May to early July, I bring back way too much fruit. It's only when I am unpacking the bags at home that I realise there is no way I could eat that much fruit before it spoils.

I've found multiple ways to solve the problems that arise out of my over enthusiastic fruit shopping. I eat fruits instead of meals. I share. And I cook it into pies and crumbles and jam. But one fruit does not take well to cooking. Lychees have such delicate flavour that any heat will completely destroy it. So when I got back yesterday with yet another fruit haul, I decided to covert some of the lychees into a no-cook sorbet.

The most difficult part of this recipe is getting the flesh off the lychees. But you don't need to be neat here since it will all get blended anyway. Rest of it is just mixing and churning. Super easy!

Ingredients
2 dozen lychees
200 ml coconut milk
3 tbsp honey
1 tbsp rum
Juice of 1 lime (the small indian lime, that gives about a tsp of juice)

Peel the lychees and separate the flesh from the seed. Put the deseeded lychees in a blender along with all the other ingredients. Rum is optional but it does give a softer ice cream.

Taste the mix, adding more honey or lime juice to suit your preference. Remember that ice cream gets less sweet as it freezes so the mixture in the blender should be a tad sweeter than you like.

Pour the mix into a container and chill for 2-3 hours. Then churn in your ice cream machine and put back in the freezer to set for a couple of hours before digging in.

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