Happy Nowruz ! It is the Persian New year this Friday and there is a lot of activities in a Persian household. There is the cleaning , the buying of all the important items for the celebration and of course the food.
I would like to give my mini contribution in giving you this delicious recipe for ‘Faloodeh’. This is a fresh lemon granita style dessert, with the palate cleansing flavour of cardamom. The rice vermicelli give it a lovely crunch.

This recipe is from my book ‘Pardiz’

• 1 litre water
• 500 gr castor sugar
• 10-12 cardamom pods, podded and ground
• 80 ml very good quality rosewater
• juice of 2-3 lemons
• 25 gr rice vermicelli

• in a saucepan boil the water, cardamom and sugar until sugar has dissolved
• set aside and let cool
• add lemon juice and rosewater
• taste, it should be quite sharp in taste
• pour into a rectangular dish and freeze
• in a little water cook the vermicelli for 3-5 minutes
• drain, refresh in cold water
• cut the vermicelli into 2 cm pieces
• take the granita out of the freezer

• with 2 forks scrape the ice and fluff it up
• mix in the vermicelli

• they will go white and harden
• put Faloodeh back into freezer until needed
• serve it in little dishes you van decorate the Faloodeh with sour cherries