Riding The Gelato Train

Im definitely on the gelato train! Italian gelato is certainly one of the best things in the world. i've known this for some time. So for this trip to Italy I had a simple goal of eating as much gelato as possible. BTW gelato is NOT ice cream. It's sooo much better, especially compared to the mostly artificial stuff you get in the USA. Two main differences:

Gelato contains on average 1/3 less sugar than ice cream and half the fat.[...]. American ice cream contains up to 60% more air than gelato does.
Ice cream is served between 0 and 10 degrees Fahrenheit; whereas gelato is served between 7 and 15 degrees Fahrenheit. This means that gelato doesn’t numb the mouth as much as ice cream, allowing the taste buds a fuller flavor experience.

I also wanted to try every possible flavor that existed. Each gelato place tends to have about a dozen flavors, so this shouldn't be too hard right? Wrong! This turned out to be much harder than I thought. Because lots of places make their own homemade gelato! It was not the same dozen flavors everywhere, but a huge variation. For example, I would go to one town and they would have a homemade flavor that was unique to that town and couldn't be found in any other town!

In Riomaggiore (one of the Cinque Terre towns) I found this great gelato quote:

In Italian it says:

"You can't buy happiness,
but you can buy gelato.
And that's practically the same thing"

So I'm on the gelato train. And proud of it. So far I'm averaging at least three gelatos a day, sometimes more. I've had gelato for breakfast, for lunch, for dinner. I've had gelato in three different towns -- in a single day! I've kayaked to another town just to eat gelato there.

It's also possible to have gelato as part of another dessert. Such as the famous Italian dessert, affogato. This is a scoop of (usually vanilla) gelato with a shot of espresso poured over it. It's great!

Note: I will keep updating this blog entry with my current gelato count at the bottom of the page.

And btw this is not even counting the many gelatos I had in Switzerland. This is only gelatos consumed in Italy!

I've also been taking pictures of some of the flavor tags: