The most recent issue of Fine Food came with a Cherimoya Lime sorbet that looked too good to pass up.   We first encountered this fruit about a year ago.  We bought one, brought it home, cut it up and immediately spit it out.  It turns out that the Cherimoya is one of those fruits you have to “learn about” to enjoy.  A friend of ours explained how it had to get brown and soft before you eat it.  We bought another one a month or two ago and waited diligently for the hard bitter interior to ripen and soften into the creamy sweet yumminess that is “Cherimoya.”

The turned out interior.

When we saw the sorbet recipe, I knew I wanted to make it.  Not finding any cherimoyas at the local regular stores, I found myself near an Uwajimaya and wandered in.  Ignoring the hefty per pound price, I bought what I needed for the sorbet and took it home.  They were already store-ripened.    When I got them home, I made the sugar syrup and set it aside and set to work scooping out the pulp of the fruit.  Three pounds of the little globes produced about what I needed for the recipe.  After the first piece was cut up, I figured out a little trick to make it easier to handle.  Cut the fruit into quarters or eighths.  Then, fold it back against itself like you do when you’ve cut a mango into blocks.  The individual seed pods separate like magic giving your finger’s easy squeezing access to push the seeds out.  Pop the skin back into it’s original shape, and you can scoop out the sweet creamy interior easy-peasy.

All served up.

The recipe calls for three cups pulp, one cup sugar syrup, a couple tablespoons fresh lime juice and a teaspoon of lime peel.  Once those are all pulverized and blended in the food processor, the mixture is set to chill until ready to churn.  I used my old fashioned electric ice cream maker complete with ice and salt because the batch was too big for my little freezer style maker.  Half an hour under the beater, and I had a thick creamy looking sorbet.  I let my mixture sit overnight, so it turned a sort of funky pinkish brown color.  Everyone agreed, though…the final product was worth the little effort it took to make.