Writing this guide to gelato and why it’s different from ice cream took me far longer than it should have because the truth is, I was planning my Italian honeymoon, which means deciding where to get gelato each day and night. I’ve imagined walking arou…
Writing this guide to gelato and why it’s different from ice cream took me far longer than it should have because the truth is, I was planning my Italian honeymoon, which means deciding where to get gelato each day and night. I’ve imagined walking around Piazza Navona with a cup of limone gelato in one hand and a cone of stracciatella in the other. I’ve imagined being greeted by the hotel concierge with a pint of pistachio and receiving a tour of the Colosseum while housing a double scoop of tiramisu. I love ice cream, too, but you can’t exactly watch a svelte man named Luca form the perfect cone of nocciotella inside a building older than the United States of America. But aside from the setting, what’s the difference between Italian gelato and ice cream, anyway?
“It’s really a question of semantics. Gelato is just the Italian word for ice cream. However, there are definitely certain qualities that gelato tends to have, and a different set of qualities that ice cream tends to have but it really depends on the individual producer,” says Hallie Meyer, owner of Caffè Panna, a New York City-based shop that churns out Roman-inspired gelato. Dr. Robert Roberts, Professor and Head of Food Science at Penn State University, adds that gelato can also include sorbet, water-based gelato, and high-fat dairy products.
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