For my vegan and lactose-intolerant friends I’ve been trying to explore more recipes that don’t involve dairy products. I stumbled upon some cheap coconut milk at the store and decided to make up something with it.

(As a side note, my friends and I got onto a biological discussion about coconut anatomy and what part of it was the seed specifically and what the heck was coconut milk anyhow. Maybe you and your scientifically-minded friends were wondering, too? Wikipedia is actually quite useful for answering this question and it turns out that coconut “milk” is actually pureed/liquified coconut meat.)

I used some decadently dark bing cherries for this recipe but any kind works. Since this was an experiment I did only a half recipe, this can easily be doubled for a full quart of dairy free ice cream.

Cherry Coconut Sorbet
(Makes 1 pint of sorbet)

Ingredients

  • 2 cups frozen or fresh cherries
  • 1/2 cups of water
  • 1/4 cup of sugar
  • 1 teaspoon of lemon juice
  • 1 cup coconut milk

Directions

  1. Remove stems and pits from cherries. If you’re using frozen cherries, half-thawed cherries are easier to pit than completely thawed ones, and once they’ve completely thawed, then the juice gets everywhere.
  2. Mix cherries with water, sugar, coconut milk and lemon juice.
  3. Puree mixture in a food processor.
  4. Churn and freeze in your ice cream machine according to its directions.