Avocado paletas

I adore Mexican paletas. They are so simple and make use of just a few simple ingredients to create lovely and light desserts. Mostly I go for the pure fruity ones but using the blessed, beautiful avocado makes for an incredibly rich and creamy taste treat without any added fat or dairy. Here's the super simple recipe.  You'll need some popsicle molds.

Yield: 6-10 popsicles

Ingredients:

1 cup water
1/2 cup sugar
2 ripe avocados
2 tbsp freshly squeezed lime juice

Put the water and sugar in a small point and gently heat until all the sugar is dissolved. You're basically making a simple sugar solution. Let it cool.

Cut and pit the avocados and put them into a blender along with the lime juice and cooled sugar water.

Waz it up until it's smooth. Then pour the bright green mixture into the popsicle molds and freeze for at least two hours.

To serve, run a bit of hot water on the outside of the mold and gently remove the popsicle. Let the oohing and aahing begin.

Blueberry paletas

On an incredibly hot day when you have a gang over for a bbq, you don’t necessarily want a heavy dessert but a hit of cool sweetness is always welcome. Mexican paletas, or popsicles, are the perfect solution. I prefer making my paletas without cream or yogurt but there are lots of people out there how will make blueberry or strawberry ones with dairy. Also, not having dairy means you can have them with a meat dinner if you’re kosher and swing that way and they are vegan.

You will need a popsicle mold for these.

Yield: 8-10 depending on the size of your molds.

Ingredients

500 g blueberries (frozen works fine)

2/3 cup water

2/3 cup of sugar

juice of half a lime

a few fresh mint leaves

First make a simple syrup. Mix the water, sugar, and mint leaves in a small pot and heat until the sugar has completely dissolved. Let it sit to cool for a bit. Once it’s cooled down, remove the mint leaves.

Put the syrup, lime juice, and blueberries into a blender and liquify it all. If you are using the fresh, larger blueberries, you might want to strain the liquid in a fine sieve to get rid of all the little seeds.

Pour the blueberry mixture into the popsicle molds and freeze. You need at least three hours, if not more, for them to freeze nicely.

To serve, loosen them from the molds by running a bit of hot tap water on the outside. They should slip out pretty easily.

© 2016 Gail J. Cohen