HOW CAN YOU RECOGNIZE THE BEST GELATO IN VENICE?

Everybody like to eat a gelato, how to find the best gelato in Venice, where you have a big offer of gelato at almost every corner, but also what does it mean a good gelato? Well, everybody have personal taste and preference, but for sure the best gelato is the hand made one, fresh, and made with quality ingredients. If you have this combination than you might have a very good gelato experience. Bare in mind that the cone has been invented in the 1903 not far from Venice, so walking with a gelato cone in Venice is a traditional experience.

HOW CAN YOU FIND A GOOD GELATERIA BY YOURSELF

If you read later you can find my favourite gelaterias in Venice, but if you want to hunt by yourself and trying to discover a good one, these are my hints in order to increase the percentage of success to eat a good gelato:

• try to go the the gelaterias which are specialized in… making gelatos! Which means a place where they sell only gelato, not a bar or restaurant with a gelato corner, because you risk to have a less fresh and more industrial product
• try to investigate if a gelateria is producing his own gelato, maybe on the backstore, in this case the gelato is granted to be fresh
• try to see if a gelateria is selling daily a big gelato quantity, in this case the product for sale is necessary fresh because made more often
• if a gelateria is on a backstreet, far from the crowd, but there’re still many people consuming gelato, most of the time it’s due to the gelato high quality

MY FAVOURITE GELATERIAS

This is just a personal list of places I like to stop time to time, for a cone, a cup or even for a box to bring home and eating with my family:

• nearby St Mark’s square I like to stop at “Gelato Fantasy”, I love especially the peanut butter flavor
• not far from the train station and the bus station (Piazzale Roma) I like the “Gelateria Alaska”, on a beautiful decoration Jamaican Reggae style, you can find here the most genuine and delicious fruit flavors
• just behind the Rialto’s bridge there’s the famous “SuSo”, a celebrated place known for the always new flavors, with eccentric combination of ingredients
• at the Zattere you can stop at “Gelateria Nico”, for sure the only one I remembered since I was a child. Here you should taste the Gianduiotto, a choccolate hazelnut brick drowned on a whipped cream cup
• if you are in Mestre, where often tourists choose to stay, right in the city center a special mention for the “Gelateria Chocolat”, especially for its salted caramel flavor.

HOW TO CHOOSE A GELATO FLAVOR

If you’re like me and you love all flavors, then you should choose randomize, orelse you can follow some easy suggestions that can improve your gelato experience:

• if it’s summertime and the temperature is very hot you should choose the fruit flavors, the percentage of water is higher, less fat percentage (good if you’re on a diet but you don’t want to miss a gelato taste)
• you’re not sweating on the venetian summer, and maybe you’re even hungry, the best choice is a creamy flavor: choccolate, stracciatella, pistachio, etc…, they have cream and milk, so a richer food
• if you’re still undecided, in the gelateria there’re too many flavors than space on the cup, ask the vendor which was the last flavor made, and take it, it has for sure the smoothest and fresh taste due to the short freezing time

THE GELATO FLAVOR IS A SPY OF THE PERSONALITY 

Tell me your gelato choice and I’ll tell you who you are. On my experience as a guide I saw many different choices regarding the flavors, usually traditional flavors, as vanilla or choccolate, are choosen by the people that are travelling outside from their country for the first time, or maybe they are at the beginning of the holidays, but sometimes there’re also people who wants to compare the flavor tastes, so they take everywhere they go always the same classic flavor in order to compare it. I’ve heard that you can judge the gelateria quality by tasting only its vanilla flavor. The italian cities frequent travellers they usually try new and unknown flavors that maybe are made just on a single place, but sometimes they combine tastes which italian people traditionally are never putting together, like sweet and acid: mango and peanut butter, peach and mint. Anyway choose your flavors in a free and creative way!

ICE CREAM OR GELATO?

From North American tourist I often received the question: “is this a gelato or an ice cream?”. In Italy we simply don’t use these categories, the main difference is between the artisanal gelato versus mass-produced gelato, both are called gelato but the first one is hand made produced, and second is factory made. Italy is the only country where the market share is 55% in favor of the artisanal gelato.

Davide Calenda