Traditional Italian Lemon Ice

This is the time of the year when this one hits the spot, so I had to make a special repost to remind everyone of this great refreshing ice!

Back in Upstate NY, where I grew up. We couldn't wait for June to arrive,

that's when our local Italian bakeries started to make this delicious Italian ice.. Then when we were fortunate enough to have a nice hot day everyone would rush down to the bakery and hope they didn't run out of it, to buy a quart or more.....so good! We would have to stand in long lines!

Here is our family recipe and our version of this lemon ice....if you aren't as fortunate to live near a wonderful Italian Pastry Shop, this will be a treat!

Italian Lemon Ice......

2 cups of bottled water

2/3 cup sugar

Zest of 2 lemons ( grated and set aside)

1 cup of fresh lemon juice ( use at least 2 lemons and enough reconstituted juice to make one cup)

Heat water and sugar to boiling. Simmer for 5 minutes additional minutes. Remove from heat. Stir in lemon juice and zest. Cool to room temperature. Divide evenly to three ice trays freeze until almost frozen, stirring every half hour when slushy freeze over night.

( To use Ice cream maker, make sure mixture is slushy before adding to machine (follow manufacturer instructions).

Take ice trays out, shave frozen with a food processor from mixture in ice trays which is recommended, you can use the back of a fork however much harder to do. If you have a hard time getting this shaved with a fork or getting this out of the trays, microwave for 20 seconds remove ice . Serve when you have a slushy but frozen consistency. Keep in air tight container, in freezer.

**This won't come out right without using the method of stirring every half hour.

Here are some optional flavors following same instructions:

FRESH PEACH, RASPBERRY or STRAWBERRY ICE

1 cup sugar

2 ½ cups water

1 ½ cups of either fruits using raspberries, strawberries or peaches (peaches must be peeled , sliced, ripe peaches)

1 ½ to 2 tsp. lemon juice

Puree fruit in blender with lemon juice.

ORANGE ICE

2 cups water

1 cup sugar

1 cup fresh orange juice

1 grated orange rind (no white part)

2 Tbs. fresh lemon juice

GRAPE ICE

2/3 cup sugar

1 ½ cups water

1 cup grape juice

¼ cup orange juice

2 Tbs. lemon juice