Lemonade Granita

Beat the summer heat with a bright, icy Lemonade Granita that tastes like sunshine in every scoop. Made with just a few simple ingredients, including lots of freshly squeezed lemon juice, the frosty ice crystal dessert is the perfect balance of sweet and tart.

Jump to:

• 💛 Why this recipe works
• 🗒 Ingredients
• 🍋 Recipe tips
• 🎉 Flavor variations
• 📖 Recipe
• 💬 Comments

Summertime is granita season! And I feel like we don't appreciate the classic Italian granita enough here in the United States.

I'm on a mission to change that by showing you how easy they are to make... And how absolutely delicious they can be!

I made a delightful strawberry granita years ago and now I'm sharing a super simple and classic lemonade granita. It tastes just like a glass of ice cold lemonade, but in ice crystal form.

💛 Why this recipe works

Frozen desserts are beloved by both kids and adults. But in the U.S. we tend to gravitate toward slushies or Italian ices in the summer.

Granitas tend to feel a lot "fancier" and "handmade," but they also super easy to make. And once finished, the coarse, irregular ice crystals melt slowly on your tongue and are so much tastier than an artificially sweetened slushie.

This lemonade granita is made with a simple syrup instead of just blending lemon juice, sugar, and water together. This gives the granita a silky and consistent texture that's the perfect sweetness.

🗒 Ingredients

Granita ingredients are generally fresh and fairly simple and this lemonade granita is couldn't be simpler. Here's everything you need (be sure to view the recipe card for ingredient amounts and full recipe instructions):

• Water
• Granulated sugar
• Freshly squeezed lemon juice
• Lemon zest: optional
• Salt

🍋 Recipe tips

• Start with a clear simple syrup. Some granitas are made by simply stirring water and sugar together, but fully dissolved sugar will prevent big ice chunks and will guarantee granita's signature fine, flaky crystals.

• If you prefer to skip this step, you can purchase a store-bought simple syrup.

• Use freshly squeezed lemon juice. Bottled lemon juice does not work for this recipe! Bottled lemon juices are pasteurized and stored long term and therefore, don't have the same flavor as freshly squeezed lemons. They mostly taste like citric acid and water, so your granita will taste more like a sour candy than lemonade.

• Add a little lemon zest if you want. The zest will add a subtle bitterness and some depth to the granita and will make your frozen dessert taste more "sophisticated." If you're making the granita for kids, you may want to keep the zest out.

• Add a pinch of salt. Believe it or not, a little bit of salt will amp up the lemon flavor and round out the sweetness of the granita.

• Use a shallow pan, like an 8x8 or 9x9. A wide, shallow pan will chill faster and more evenly than a tall, narrow one. And a metal pan will chill fastest.

• Get scraping. Scraping is the most important part of granita making. After your lemonade granita has been int he freezer for about 45 minutes, take a look at it. If the edges have started to freeze, grab a fork and gently rake the surface to break up ice crystals.

• Repeat the scraping every 30 minutes. After about 2 hours, you should have it completely scraped and the mixture should be completely uniform and flaky.

• Serve the granita right away. I recommend serving it in chilled bowls. If you keep it in the freezer to long, it will freeze into one hard slab of ice instead of ice crystal shards. If you leave it at room temperature, it will melt pretty quickly.

• If you are storing it for later, keep it in an airtight, shallow container. When you’re ready to serve, let the container sit at room temperature for 5–10 minutes to let edges soften and then use a fork to rake through and break it back into fluffy crystals. A quick 30 seconds of scraping should revive most of the texture.

I like to top my lemonade granita with more lemon zest, but obviously this adds a little more bitterness to the dessert.

No matter how you serve it, this icy treat is absolutely incredible and will make you feel like you're sitting in a little cafe in Sicily.

It's the perfect balance of sweet and sour and ideal for any lovers of lemon desserts.

The ice crystals melt on your tongue and it almost doesn't feel like such a simple dessert has the right to feel so fancy!

🎉 Flavor variations

I love the simplicity of lemonade granita, but there are so many ingredients you can add to customize the flavor a bit.

Here are some ideas:

• Strawberry: fold some strawberry puree into the mixture before freezing.
• Blueberry: Add fresh blueberry puree.
• Raspberry: Add fresh raspberry puree.
• Watermelon: Swap some of the water for freshly blended watermelon juice.
• Cucumber: Puree a peeled cucumber, extract juice with a fine mesh sieve and add to mixture.
• Mint: add mint leaves to simple syrup mixture as you simmer it.
• Basil: add basil leaves to simple syrup.
• Ginger: Add fresh ginger slices to simple syrup.
• Jalapeño: Add chopped jalapeño peppers to your syrup.
• Lavender: Once your simple syrup is made, stir dried culinary grade lavender in, let it steep for an hour, and then strain it out.
• Alcohol: turn the granita into an adult dessert with a splash of limoncello, gin, or vodka right before freezing.

No matter the million summer flavor combinations you can come up with, there's just something about a simple lemonade granita that hits so perfectly on a hot summer day.

Lemon lovers; I hope you try this recipe! If you're a fan, you need to try my soft lemon cookies, too!

📖 Recipe