Watermelon Granita

I was eating a lot of chocolate ice-cream during the last few months this year and it all started because Baskin-Robbins was offering one box free with every box you bought at the supermarkets. And we loved their Bavarian Chocolate flavour - silky smooth, had a few crunchy bits in between and real dark chocolate flavour. I could lick the box clean if no one was looking, or even if someone is looking (depends on who is), that's how much i liked it. And then once those people knew i was addicted, they took back the special offer. You can guess i was not too happy, and to register my protest i stopped buying them. But did the cravings for something ice cold and sweet stop?

You can bet they did not. Every night after dinner i would sigh loudly and wonder when Baskin-Robbins will bring that special offer back. In between i bought another popular local brand of chocolate ice-cream that was more milky than chocolaty and i thought actually smelled of raw milk. I finished it with great difficulty, and realised that day that i too had a discerning palette, i realised i want great tasting food but i also want it reasonably priced (umm cheap). Yeah, i am always wishing too much, ain't i?

Miraculously, my obsession with food blogs was what came to my rescue. The Pioneer Woman showed me this wonderful Watermelon Granita. And it looks even more drool-worthy on her blog. My work here is to tell anyone who didn't see her recipe yet to go try it, and try it as soon as you can get your hands on a watermelon. I am telling you, you will be rewarded handsomely for your efforts. And you may want it all for yourself too. Now almost every night for the last one week, i eagerly look forward for dinner to get over so i can lay my hands on this granita, and i invariably go back for a second helping. I have utterly fallen for this fat-free dessert, and Baskin-Robbins better bring back their special offer soon, or they will have lost this loyal customer for good.

Recipe Source: The Pioneer Woman Cooks

Ingredients

4 cups of watermelon chunks, de-seeded

1/4 cup sugar

juice of 1 lime

Out of the blender and into my fancy twister glass - tastes delicious already

Method

I could only find a seeded water melon and i used half of a 3.5 kilo watermelon. I cut the water melon into slices, removed the seeds and then cut into small chunks to measure them. 

Place all the ingredients together in a blender and process until smooth. Transfer to a 8 x 5  inch baking dish. Cover with plastic wrap and store in freezer. Remove the dish from the freezer every 3 hours or so and scrape the top of the frozen liquid. The outer edges will freeze more than the centre. The scraped ice will remain frozen like fresh snow even when you re-freeze after scraping. Once you have scraped all the ice from the bottom of the dish, you can leave it in the freezer as long as you like and help yourself to it anytime you want.

Sorry that i didn't have a fancier glass to serve my granita in, but in the end taste is all that matters - according to the guys at Masterchef Australia. So this still wins :)
Linking this to the event "Spotlight: Colourful Holi" by Chandrani of Cuisine Delights.
Linking this to Sobha's Just 4 fun event at Good Food.