Granita Siciliana alle Mandorle

Granita is not sorbet. Say this aloud before you begin, so you understand what you are making. Sorbet is smooth, refined, the work of machines. Granita is coarse, crystalline, the work of your hands and a fork. The texture should be rough on the tongue, individual flakes of ice that melt instantly. If you have eaten granita from an ice cream shop and found it smooth, you have not eaten granita.

In Sicily, granita alle mandorle is breakfast. Not dessert. Breakfast. The people of Catania and Messina wake before dawn, walk to their local bar, and eat almond ice with warm brioche col tuppo, the soft bun with its distinctive topknot. They tear pieces of bread and dip them into the frozen crystals. The bread softens, the ice melts, and for one moment the morning heat is forgotten.

The almonds must be fresh. Stale almonds taste like cardboard and will ruin everything. Sicilian almonds from Avola are incomparable, intensely flavored with a slight bitterness that balances the sweetness. If you cannot find them, use the best blanched almonds available, and add the smallest amount of pure almond extract to approximate that complexity. What you keep out matters: no cream, no eggs, no stabilizers. Water, sugar, almonds. That is all.