Easy Lemon Sherbet

Refreshing in summer and a reminder of warm days in winter, this easy homemade lemon sherbet is creamy, sweet, tart, and light on the tongue.

By Amy Traverso

Dec 01 2016

Easy homemade lemon sherbet.

Photo Credit : Amy Traverso

What is sherbet and how was it different from sorbet? I never quite knew until this delicious recipe inspired a little research. Turns out sherbet is like a cross between ice cream and sorbet. It has fruit juice, sugar and some dairy, but not enough to qualify as ice cream. The name comes from the Persian sharbat, which is an iced fruit drink. What’s so great about sherbet? It’s more decadent than sorbet, but infinitely easier to make than custard-based ice cream. You simply stir the fruit juice with some sugar, then add the dairy and freeze. This homemade lemon version is creamy, sweet, tart, and light on the tongue. Forget the neon orange sherbet that may have turned you off the whole category. This is a truly delicious dessert. This recipe was submitted by Yankee reader Irmarie Jones, who received it from her mother-in-law in the 1950s. Given the amount of cream in the recipe, it probably falls closer to the ice cream category than most sherbets, but I can’t argue with anything about it. It’s too good.

GET THE RECIPE: Easy Lemon Sherbet

This post was first published in 2014 and has been updated.

Amy Traverso

Amy Traverso is the senior food editor at Yankee magazine and co-host of the public television series Weekends with Yankee, a coproduction with WGBH. Previously, she was food editor at Boston magazine and an associate food editor at Sunset magazine. Her work has also been published in The Boston Globe, Saveur, and Travel & Leisure, and she has appeared on Hallmark Home & Family, The Martha Stewart Show, Throwdown with Bobby Flay, and Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares. Amy is the author of The Apple Lover’s Cookbook, which was a finalist for the Julia Child Award for best first-time author and won an IACP Cookbook Award in the “American” category.

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