I found my favorite new toy - the Cuisinart Frozen Yogurt-Ice Cream & Sorbet Maker -by accident in a discount store.

It was new, and cost something like $29. This was a real steal since its normal price is more like $80, $90 or even $100. Maybe my sorbet maker was marked down because its red color (which I like) was discontinued. (By the way, I got the last one. I know this because a friend already called the store, Tuesday Morning (the store, not the time element), to see if it had others. Sorry, it was just one of those isolated merchandise flukes.)

I can spend quite a hunk of money on my quest to save money, sometimes on kitchen stuff I imagine I’ll use, but never really do. The surgically sharp mandolin comes to mind. Basically, I’m afraid of it. Hey, I need these fingers to type and pluck gray eyebrows.

But this time, my bargain-hunting paid off. My Cuisinart Frozen Yogurt-Ice Cream & Sorbet Maker is my new best kitchen friend.

Yes, my trusty old electric ice cream-maker can produce one whopping gallon of ice cream, enough for a crowd. It also requires a bit of tending and fussing, what with the layering of ice, salt, ice, salt, etc., until it’s done. And it’s noisy. And it leaves quite the wet, salty mess. Besides, who has bags of ice on standby at all times?

My new little Cuisinart sorbet maker makes 1 1/2 quarts of ice cream or sorbet. You dump everything in its little insulated bowl that’s kept in the freezer until the mood strikes to make ice cream or sorbet. It churns away on my kitchen counter where I can peek inside and see how it’s doing.

Which reminds me, if you’re easily distracted and inclined to wander away from your task at hand, the sorbet maker will punish you by moving beyond its fluffy perfectness and returning to its original liquid stage. By then your machine’s bowl is too thawed to repeat its performance. In psychology it’s called classic conditioning.

For a while I made vanilla and chocolate ice cream and variations of each. Yawn.

Then I discovered sorbet. I fell in love, which surprised me, since I tend to believe the world is divided into two groups: chocolate-bready people and fruit-salty people. I’m more of a chocolate-bready person.

Not when it comes to sorbet. And oh my gosh, it could not be easier to make.

Two things: Fruit, and simple syrup (basically, simple syrup is hummingbird food). That’s it. Dump it in the frozen bowl, place that inside the ice cream maker, insert the paddle, snap on the top and flip the switch. In about 20 minutes you’ll have sorbet.

I kind of went a little nuts with sorbet. My first try was strawberry, which I followed by the book that came with my little sorbet machine.

Loved it! I never consulted the book again, and moved on to other flavors: apricot, lemon, raspberry, blood orange and even kiwi. I did experience some strangeness with lemon (but not blood orange) sorbet. It just never really set up properly. It was more sticky than icy. This wasn’t a deal-killer. It just lacked the same beautiful, smooth, slightly crystally consistency of the others.

Allow me to digress momentarily as I mention a recent cooking class in which I had the pleasure to teach six teens how to cook a slew of foods - including lemon sorbet - in just four hours. One girl tasted the lemon sorbet, paused and said something that nearly made me weep with joy:

“This lemon sorbet is just on the verge of sour,” she said, “But not too.”

Exactly.

There’s much to love about sorbet. Its colors are gorgeous. It contains no fat (OK, so there’s sugar, let’s not get carried away here). But most of all, it tastes just like real fruit, and its possibilities are only limited to your available fruit: mangoes, blueberries, strawberries, peach, just about anything. (I’ve never tried banana, but you’d need to add lemon juice to keep it from turning an unappetizing gray color.)

Apricot was one of my favorite sorbets, both for its creamy texture and incredible taste. And guess what? I used canned apricots.

Please do not think less of me.

At any rate, my freezer is packed with sorbet this very minute. In fact, if you knocked on my door and asked to see my sorbet collection, you’d be amazed.

Don’t get me wrong, I haven’t gone completely over to the fruit side. I wouldn’t dream of plopping a scoop of sorbet in a bowl and calling it good. It just needs … something. So I serve it with a little cookie, or inside a thin cookie bowl (another week we’ll talk about those damn bowls, oy what troubles they gave me), or the easiest yet, inside a chocolate bowl.

Don’t groan and roll your eyes. If you’ve made my chocolate leaves, you can do this. Spread melted chocolate over a small, upside-down, plastic-wrapped covered bowl. Let it harden. One chocolate bowl, coming right up.

Fill ‘er up. Hooray for sorbet.

Printer-friendly recipe

Strawberry Sorbet

2 cups *strawberries
1 1/4 cups simple syrup (see recipe)
1 tablespoon orange juice
1 teaspoon orange zest

In a blender puree the strawberries and about 1/2 of the simple syrup.

Add the rest of the ingredients and give it a whirl. Pour it into an ice cream maker and follow the manufacturer’s directions, although on my machine it takes about 20 to 30 minutes.

*Optional: if you use other fruit, such as peaches, first peel and core the fruit.

Simple Sugar Syrup

2 cups water
2 cups sugar

Bring the sugar and water to a boil, stirring often. Reduce heat and gently simmer until all the sugar is dissolved, about 5 minutes.

Keep stored in the refrigerator until ready to use.

Makes about 2 1/2 ups.

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