Nostalgic push up popsicles, with a creamy peach sorbet.
For me, no ice cream novelty is more elusive—or more nostalgia-inducing—than orange sherbet push up popsicles. But, when the ice cream truck stopped coming around, and we couldn’t find any at the grocery store, my husband and I decided to make our own.
Because we had ripe peaches going bad, our popsicles are peach instead of orange. As it turns out though, the peaches—once frozen and blended with yogurt—create a naturally creamy sorbet. A handful of mint, a zest of lemon, and a pinch of salt round out the flavor profile for what I suppose you could call a “grown-up” popsicle. We also included whole berries, which become delightfully crunchy frozen chunks.
With all that being said, you may still be wondering how we put the push-up into these pops. The answer is something called cake pop shooters. I didn’t realize cake pop shooters were a thing (and I’m not sure how I feel about them) but the molds did work perfectly for this. You could, however, skip the whole push-up thing altogether and just have delicious popsicle-shaped popsicles instead. That’s up to you.
-Ryne 8/30/2023
Making frozen peach cubes
In order to make the sorbet for these push up popsicles, you need frozen peaches. You can get already frozen peaches from the grocery store, or you can freeze fresh peaches. To make the one pound of peaches needed for this recipes, you will need 3-4 medium peaches (or 1 giant peach, like James). Just chunk up the peaches (don’t bother peeling since they will be blended anyways), spread out on a sheet pan, and freeze until solid. Once frozen you can transfer them to a bag, and store in the freezer until ready to use.
Peach, Berry, and Mint Push Up Popsicles
Ingredients
- 1 lb (4 cups) frozen peach cubes about 3-4 peaches if starting from fresh
- ½ cup sugar
- 1 cup plain whole fat yogurt or half and half
- Pinch salt
- 1 small lemon zest
- 10 leaves mint
- 1 pint fresh berries whole or cut in half if using strawberries
Instructions
- Allow peaches to thaw slightly, for 20-30 minutes, at room temperature.
- In a blender, combine peaches, sugar, yogurt or half and half, salt, lemon zest, and mint leaves. Blend on high speed until smooth. You may need to stop and stir contents of blender to get things going.
- Fill push-up or popsicles molds about a third of the way full. You can either spoon in the sorbet mixture, or pipe it in with a pipping bag.
- Add 2-3 fresh berries to the mold, atop the sorbet. Fill molds another third of the way with sorbet. Top with 2-3 more berries, then top with the remainder of sorbet. If any berries remain, place them on top.
- Cover and transfer molds to the freezer. Freeze until solid, at least 8 hours. If using popsicle sticks, add them after the popsicles have been in the freezer for an hour.
