Drinks · 3 min read ·
Ottoman Sherbets: The Cool Drinks of the Turkish Table
What a Turkish şerbet is, how it differs from Pakistani sharbat, and how to make the classics at home: sour cherry, rose, tamarind, mulberry, quince and cornelian cherry, plus hoşaf and lohusa şerbeti.
The word sharbat travelled a long way. It started in Arabic as sharba, a drink, passed through Persian, and reached both the Ottoman court and the Mughal court. In Pakistan it gave us Rooh Afza, badam sharbat and imli aloo bukhara. In Turkey it gave şerbet: cool, sweet drinks made from fruit, flowers and spices, once served at palace banquets, weddings and religious festivals.
What makes a Turkish şerbet
A şerbet is a syrup made from fruit or flowers, sweetened and often sharpened with lemon, then diluted with cold water and served with ice. Compared with Pakistani sharbat, the Turkish versions are usually:
- Lighter: fewer ingredients, often just one fruit plus sugar and lemon.
- More sour: the best Turkish sherbets balance sweet and tart.
- Gently spiced: cloves and cinnamon appear often, but in small amounts.
- Homemade: the syrup is cooked fresh, not bought in a bottle.
The classics
Vişne şerbeti, sour cherry: the most popular fruit sherbet in Turkey, deep red and tangy.
Gül şerbeti, rose: pale pink and fragrant, made with rose water and a lemon syrup. The roses of Isparta are famous across Turkey.
Demirhindi şerbeti, tamarind: a Ramadan favourite in Istanbul, spiced with cloves and cinnamon. Pakistani imli is perfect for it.
Karadut şerbeti, black mulberry: deep purple, made in early summer, and an excellent use for Pakistani shahtoot.
Ayva şerbeti, quince: simmered until the fruit turns rosy, a winter sherbet made from bihi.
Kızılcık şerbeti, cornelian cherry: the classic Ottoman wedding sherbet, bright red and sharp. Our recipe includes an aloo bukhara version for Pakistan.
Two special ones
Lohusa şerbeti is a warm red sherbet with cloves and cinnamon, offered to guests who come to see a new baby. It’s a lovely idea for an aqiqa.
Hoşaf is half drink, half dessert: dried apricots, raisins and plums simmered in light syrup and served icy cold with pilav or at iftar.
Making sherbet syrup at home
Almost every sherbet follows the same pattern:
- Simmer the fruit (or flowers or spices) in a little water.
- Strain, then add sugar and simmer briefly to make a light syrup.
- Add lemon juice to balance the sweetness and stop crystallisation.
- Cool, bottle and refrigerate. Dilute about 1 part syrup to 3 or 4 parts cold water.
Taste the syrup before bottling. It should be strong and almost too sweet and sour on its own, because water will soften it. Fragrant ingredients like rose water go in only after the syrup has cooled.
Serving
Serve sherbets very cold in clear glasses so the colour shows. At a dawat, make two contrasting syrups a day ahead (say, rose and tamarind) and set them out with jugs of cold water and ice so guests can mix their own. It’s less work than mocktails and looks beautiful on the table. For more drink ideas for a crowd, see mocktails for a crowd.
