Sorbet is a frozen dessert made using ice combined with fruit juice, fruit purée or other ingredients, such as wine, liqueur or honey. Generally, sorbets do not contain dairy ingredients, while sherbets do. Etymology The word "sorbet" enters the English language from French, derived from the Italian sorbetto, which in turn came from the Ottoman Turkish or Iranian sharbat, originally referring to a type of beverage. The word sharbat is derived from the Arabic verb "shariba", which means "to drink". Sherbet in Europe still refers to a type of flavored drink, while North American sherbet is similar to sorbet. August Escoffier describes sorbet as "very light and barely-congealed ices, served after the Entrées. They serve in freshening the stomach; preparing it to properly receive the roast. They are appetizers and help to aid digestion". Sorbet is sometimes referred to as "water ice", Oxford English Dictionary defines sorbet as an alternate term sharing the same meaning as sherbet, a beverage. The usage of "sorbet" to describe a beverage is attested to in the English language literature in the 16ths and 17th centuries. A 17th century text describes sorbetta as "a kinde of drinke made of Water, Suger, and iuyce of Lemonds, mixed with Amber and Muske". The term was still being used for drinks in the 19th century: "They resorted to drink coffee and sorbet, with laughter and merriment". History It is believed that sorbets originated in ancient Persia as far back as 550-530 BCE. There are a number of legendary origin myths, unsupported by any known evidence, that attribute the origins of sorbet to historical figures like the Roman Emperor Nero, Marco Polo and the Italian duchess Catherine de' Medici. Romans did not add ice to their drinks because easily accessible ice along the lower slopes was not sanitary for use in food preparation. Iced drinks were believed to cause convulsions, colic and a host of other ailments. Hippocrates was known to have criticized chilled drinks for causing "fluxes of the stomach", while Seneca lambasted the extravagant costs associated with iced desserts. Despite this, ice and snow were prized ingredients in ancient cuisines including Japanese, Chinese, Greek and Roman cuisines. The first Western mention of sherbet is an Italian reference to something that Turks drink. The word sherbet entered the Italian language as sorbetto, which later became sorbet in French. August Escoffier describes sorbet as "very light and barely-congealed ices,