Sugarbaby: A Watermelon to Remember

It was a slow drift, something I didn't even really notice until there I was in front of a catered fruit platter at a work lunch looking at the watermelon from a great distance. Where once I would have reached out on instinct for a wedge, I could only gaze on it with sorrow. I knew it would be tasteless, soggy, pale, pathetic, a poor excuse for the summer fruit of my youth, slurped from a time-honored position, arms and face extended, juice dripping steadily on the grass rather than down my front. And thus, watermelon for me went the way of grocery store tomatoes, peaches, apples--down that sad road to "not even worth it" status.



Enter, sugarbaby. I'm sure there are other varieties of watermelon that are still perfect at their prime, but I have not experienced such watermelon paradise as cracking open the small dark green round sugarbaby and digging in to its sweet crush of fruit ever in my life.

See, I'd been angry with Saveur's September issue ever since it arrived in early August. Its cover features a truly beautiful watermelon, a taunting sort of watermelon, the kind of melon I'd given up on. Inside, a plethora of dishes sweet and savory featured a spectrum of watermelon varieties that I'd never seen. The editors also offered a list of their top 18 cultivars, starting with Sugarbaby and ending with Cream of Saskatchewan. I had a desperate kind of twitching; I wanted watermelon so badly.



The majority of watermelon sold in the US has at least in some part a parent in the cultivar Charleston Gray, a variety developed in the 1940s at a USDA Vegetable Breeding Laboratory in South Carolina. Scientists there had been working to develop a commercially viable melon for years and finally succeeded in the unappetizingly named Gray, which boasted a hard rind and the now-familiar oblong shape that made it easy to ship and stack in grocery stores. I knew that anything born of such parentage as the Gray was out. Here and there in Massachusetts we find other melons, small round ice-box melons which, sadly, tend also to be tasteless and dull. The obvious answer was to start looking out for heirloom, local, or other varieties of watermelon which may be less practical from a shipping and marketing standpoint, but had to be more satisfying.



Though watermelons do grow in the area (reportedly... not that I've had any success with them, but then you should see my cabbages...also pretty weak) I cannot find them for sale. There's not a melon in sight at any farmer's market I've poked around, none in the orchards or farms, no local or heirloom varieties in the stores. I'd just about given up when on a fateful Sunday shopping trip, I picked up a local Crenshaw melon, turned my head to put an ear to it and as my eyes turned down the open stalls of fruit, I caught sight of a pile of large forest green melons. Could it be? Crenshaw forgotten, I went to them. I lifted one up. It was heavier than it looked. I tapped it and the sound came back dense and wet, like slapping a waterbed. Walking with my heavy prize I could feel it, the fruit like huge bowl of barely-set jello, so full of juice there was almost a ripple inside the rind. Score.



The first sugarbaby I devoured, more or less by myself. They're small(ish). I cut wedges, installed myself in the backyard, attracted an audience of squirrels and ants and just enjoyed. It was the melon I'd been waiting for. How long would they be around? I was concerned, went back at the soonest opportunity and bought two. The second I started in on immediately, scooping half of it into jewel-like little balls, promising myself that I would do something more interesting with them than just eat, but then there I was offering friends toothpicks and the precious bowl of fruit. Using a melon baller on the sugarbaby left behind cups of juice. As the blunt tool cut into the fruit, the rind filled with bright, beautiful, sweet and deeply refreshing juice. Drinking it took me back to hot, humid nights with the bright lights and chatter of nightmarkets in Southeast Asia with pitchers of watermelon juice calling to me as a perfect ending to meal of mee and Chinese broccoli, but really, it was even better, the flavor stronger and clearer.



I'm often a wreck when reading about food, getting all worked up about all the things I want to try or get inspired by, and a good picture can send me over the edge, straight into the kitchen. That's how it was with this shot from August's Gourmet. I didn't even know what it was, but I wanted to make it. As luck would have it, Gourmet was just as wrapped up with watermelon as I was and this dessert, a watermelon sorbet base with a creamy lime semifreddo top was just what I was looking for.



The sugarbaby made a wonderful sorbet, bright and cheery and with a great texture, not too icy, not too sugary. Semifreddo, a frozen dessert I'd never had before is actually a great time saver as well as a great treat. A creamy base infused with tangy lime zest, the mixture is whipped and then simply poured over the frozen sorbet base. For those without an ice cream maker or without inclination to drag one out from wherever it's hiding, this is a great alternative. Semifreddo means half-cold, which on the face of it seems odd since it is indeed frozen, but since it is not stirred as it freezes, the air incorporated in it through whipping the cream or custard that serves as its base gives it an a lighter, more melting mouth-feel to it and makes it seem to be not completely frozen. Technically, semifreddo is a class of desserts which could include anything served partially frozen--a cake, a custard, a mousse--but it seems most commonly to refer to something like this tequila lime layer. My adaptation of the watermelon sorbet and lime semifreddo is below and makes for a really nice hot night dessert offering.



The other thing in Gourmet that caught my eye allowed me to make use of my melon baller again and I knew that because of the incredible color of the sugarbaby, it would yield a gorgeous dessert. A final page of simple but incredible looking "sundaes" included a recipe for Lemon Sorbetto with Watermelon and Anisette. The recipe calls for store-bought lemon sorbet or Italian ice, but I broke out my ice cream maker, a bag of beautiful organic lemons, and a new bottle of limoncello to make my own extremely lemony sorbet (1/2 cup water, 2 small lemons zest, 1 cup fresh lemon juice, 2 tablespoons limoncello, mix well and turn on the machine). Tossing about 2 pounds of watermelon balls with 3 tablespoons of anisette and a handful of fresh chopped pineapple mint (I opted to cut the sugar called for by Gourmet, to no harm) and when the sorbet was ready, a wonderfully complex and deliciously refreshing dessert was born. There's no doubt this is a summer go to for me from now on.



I had one more project left in my sugarbaby and that was watermelon rind pickle, something I'd never tried, but have always wanted to. Using a sharp vegetable peeler on a well-scraped hunk of melon, I removed the hardest, darkest part of the rind and the turned the piece to its narrowest side. A mandolin would work here, but it was just as easy to slice off thin strips of rind with the peeler. Hot water, vinegar, peppercorns and salt poured over the strips of rind, shaken and stowed for a day in the fridge and I had a nice little pickle.



I used most of it to top fried seitan steak sandwiches on homemade rosemary olive oil bread, but it would be a good condiment for lots of sandwiches or main dishes. The watermelon rind pickle got me started early on my lazy pickling this year, something I usually just do in the fall with a big bag or two of CSA pickling cukes. The watermelon rind opened up my mind to pickling possibilities though I did up a big batch of fridge pickles with green tomatoes, radishes, beets and garlic scapes... all of which sounds to me like another post. I've resolved to try creating shorter, more frequent posts. I don't want to veer too far from doing the kind of writing I enjoy here and wind up with just recipe-focused posts, but I think I can look for slightly narrower topics. I'm immersed in one too many big projects lately, so turning posts into more manageable affairs will be helpful for me and hopefully still be enjoyable for everyone.

Watermelon Sorbet and Tequila-Lime Semifreddo
adapted from Gourmet, 8/08

for sorbet:
2 1/2 pounds watermelon, rind cut (sugarbaby is a great choice)
1/4 cup cane sugar
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon tequila

for semifreddo:
1/2 cup soymilk
1/2 cup soy creamer OR 1/2 cup thick, fresh almond milk (soak 1 cup of almonds in 2 cups of water overnight, blend and strain through cheesecloth, squeezing the almond pulp to release the liquid)
1/3 cup boiling water
2 tablespoons safflower or other mild tasting oil
1/2 cup fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon tequila
2 teaspoons lime zest
1/2 cup vegan whipped cream, optional (I used Soyatoo, whipped to peaks)

To make the sorbet: Puree the watermelon in a food processor and pass through a colander to remove seeds without straining out much of the flesh. Combine melon with other ingredients and freeze in an ice cream maker. When frozen, spread with an off-set spatula evenly along the bottom of a 9" square baking pan lined with overhanging parchment paper and store with a layer of plastic wrap secured over it in the freezer.

To make the semifreddo:
Combine the soymilk and creamer or almond milk, sugar, boiling water and oil, whisking well to combine and dissolve the sugar. Add the juice, tequila and zest whisking well. If using, whip the soy whippable cream and then gently fold into the mixture. Pour over the watermelon sorbet and leave overnight to set.

To serve, lift the sides of parchment and remove the whole frozen square. Cut into 12 pieces and serve with fresh melon and mint.