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You never know what a kid will want, and my nephew wanted lemon granita. Although the icy dessert doesn’t necessarily spring to my mind in winter, it makes a certain amount of sense. First, lemons are in season, more or less, and, second, freezers don’t have to work as hard in winter as they do in the warmer, more humid summertime.

So, lemon granita it was. If you want to make it too, simply substitute lemon juice in the lime granita recipe. (We also reduced the sugar to 1/4 cup.) It’s remarkably easy.

And so we begin

First, Sam cut the lemons in half. He’s a stickler for safety, so he readily followed the directions for keeping his fingers out of the way of the knife.

Always time for clowning.

Then, we squeezed the juice using my handy juicer. (I see it isn’t rated too well on Amazon. Works great for me. For large oranges or grapefruit, simple quarter the fruit first.) Sam already knew the drill from school.

Hey! There’s Sam’s reflection!

To the stove and freezer

Lemons squeezed, we simply brought the juice, sugar and water to a boil, then poured it into a shallow pan. We let the mixture cool a bit before putting it into the freezer and periodically scraping up the ice crystals as they formed.

In between, I taught Sam a nifty game, which he promptly mastered and beat me at several times, the rascal.

His patient mother (I told her to pick him up sooner than I should have) took him home to share his icy winter citrus. Next weekend, his sister will be at the stove. She’s older, so we can get more done. We’ll see what treats await.