Paisano: Blood Orange Granita

I spent a week in Italy in 1999. My parents were in Europe while my father attended a couple of conferences (he's a master at getting other people to pay for him to travel) and they'd decided to tack a week on to the end of their trip in Italy. They invited me to join them and when I agreed they rented a villa in the middle of Tuscan nowhere - it was a gorgeous place.

The villa was a bit ram-shackle and run-down - what's often called shabby elegance - and the kitchen wasn't particularly well-equipped, but it had a few striking trompe l'oeil paintings on the wall, executed by the owner and the beds were decent. Shabby or not, il-equipped or not, the place was on the whole comfortable.

We would make day trips to see the sites each day - searching for things we hadn't seen on previous trips. As I recall went took the train the 40 or 50 miles into Rome only a couple of times and for the rest (we'd done Rome) and mostly hit the roads in our rented car. But one thing we missed on that trip that we had seen before was good food.

Sure, when we hit a grocery store before returning to the villa each evening and cooking our own dinner the food was excellent, but we only had two good restaurant meals while we were there. In this country I'm used to having to do research in order to find good places to eat when I travel, but in Italy I assumed good food would be commonplace. Nope.Nevertheless, there was something I wish I'd tried while I was there but didn't even know about 10 years ago: granita.

It wasn't until about four years ago that I discovered these Italian ices and fell in love with them. I've posted my recipes for Coffee Granita and Sangria Granita, but my Blood Orange Granita is the oddest in flavor, and yet, perhaps, the best one I've come up with. Their season is over with (sorry for the delay), but ordinary oranges work as well.

Orange Granita with Grand Marnier and Lavender
Makes 6 servings.

 1 cup water
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon dried lavender (you can probably find this at a store such as Whole Foods)
6 tablespoons Grand Marnier or Triple Sec
3 cups orange juice (8 to 9 oranges)

Bring water and sugar to a boil in a small saucepan over high heat, stirring to dissolve sugar. Remove from heat as soon as it begins to boil and add lavender. Cool to room temperature then strain into a 9 x 13 pan. Add orange juice and Grand Marnier then place in the freezer. Follow directions for freezing and serving in General Methods.