Red Currant and Lemon Balm Sorbet

This is a recipe inspired/adopted from this Red Currant Sorbet recipe. I've replaced the use of citrus with lemon balm, an herb widely grown in gardens and commonly found in the wild. It adds aroma and even more cooling satisfaction to this summertime treat.

I made this in tandem with red currant sauce, so I just drew off 250ml from the red currant juice I was going to use for the sauce.

Red Currant and Lemon Balm Sorbet

What You Need:

150ml water
140g sugar
1 large handful of fresh lemon balm
250ml of red current juice/pulp, strained

• Wash and de-stem around 1 quart of fresh red currants.


• Add the de-stemmed berries to a food processor or blender. Alternatively, you could use a large bowl and an immersion blender. Puree and then strain as much juice/pulp as possible through a sieve. Set aside.


• Add the water, sugar, and lemon balm to a medium pot and bring to a boil. Cover and simmer for 5 minutes (covering keeps the essential oils from dissipating into the air). Once the sugar is dissolved and the sugar well dissolved, take it off the heat and allow to cool.


• Once the syrup is cool, strain off the lemon balm.


• Mix the syrup with the currant pulp a little a at a time—stirring and tasting after each addition. This allows you to control how tart/sweet the sorbet becomes. Any excess syrup can be used to make a refreshing drink mixed with sparkling water or added to tea, etc.


• If you have an ice cream maker you can use this to make the sorbet. Alternatively, you can simply pour the mixture into a shallow glass baking dish and pop it into the freezer. Take it out of the freezer every 15-20 minutes for an hour or so, stirring/grating each time with a fork to separate the ice crystals.