No. 3610

Gramolates or Granite with Orange

Gramolates ou Granit a l'Orange

Put in a vessel one quart of fifteen-degree syrup, the juice and peels of three oranges; cover over and leave infuse for one hour; add the juice of four lemons and a little orange vegetal carmine; strain through a silk sieve and freeze. Peel three oranges to the pulp, remove the pulp by passing the knife near each section and lay the pieces in a bowl with a very little sugar and kirsch; steep for half an hour then add it to the ice and serve in glasses.

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For the Modern Kitchen

A granita rather than a sorbet: the point is a coarse, crystalline ice, not a smooth one. Ranhofer assumes a professional pastry kitchen with a syrup hydrometer and a hand-cranked freezer, but nothing here needs either.

Fifteen-degree syrupDegrees Baumé, read with a saccharometer. Fifteen degrees is roughly 27 percent sugar by weight, so a quart is made with about 10 oz (285 g) sugar dissolved in about 27 oz (800 ml) water. This is a light syrup by dessert standards, which is what keeps the ice grainy.
PeelsOnly the coloured zest, pared thin with no white pith, or the hour-long infusion turns bitter. The peels of three oranges scent the whole quart.
Orange vegetal carmineA period colouring. It does nothing for flavour; leave it out, or use a few drops of a modern natural colouring if you want the pale syrup to look like oranges.
Silk sieveA fine-mesh strainer or a double layer of cheesecloth. The aim is to catch zest and pulp fibre so the ice freezes evenly.
Freezing without a machinePour the strained syrup into a shallow metal pan, freeze, and rake it with a fork every 30 minutes for 3 to 4 hours until it is loose crystals. A churned ice-cream machine gives the wrong texture here — granita means granular.
The suprêmesCutting the pulp free "near each section" is what is now called supreming: the segments come out membrane-free. Half an hour in a little sugar and kirsch is enough; longer and they slump.
AssemblyFold the fruit in at the last moment, or the alcohol and juice will soften the crystals. Serve immediately in chilled glasses.
YieldA quart of syrup plus fruit gives roughly six to eight small glasses; the recipe itself gives no yield.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer, chef at Delmonico's in New York, published The Epicurean in 1894 as a complete record of the restaurant's kitchen, and its ices run to dozens of numbered formulas. Granit or granité takes its name from the granular texture produced by freezing a lightly sweetened liquid without churning it smooth — the low sugar content of the fifteen-degree syrup is precisely what allows large crystals to form. Ices of this kind were served in the middle of a long formal dinner, between the heavier courses; the page's own navigation places this one among Iced Drinks. The instruction to measure syrup in Baumé degrees is a reminder that a nineteenth-century professional pastry department worked with instruments, not cup measures.