This Food in History #3 Gelato — Uncultured Palate

Jan 18

Jan 18 This Food in History #3 Gelato

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Welcome to This Food in History, today is our last day in Italy and we’re going to look at Gelato.

There is a small but meaningful difference between Gelato and Ice Cream and this makes the flavor and texture different. Gelato is made with milk instead of cream and has a lower fat content. It also has less air whipped into it and is denser. Gelato is always to be eaten soft, similar to soft serve ice cream.

Fun Fact: You store Gelato at a higher temp than ice cream: between 0 and 10 F, while served at 10-20 F. Ice cream needs kept at -20 F or colder.

So how did we get here?

History once again has evidence that China has the earliest ice cream making practices with adding rock salt to a mixture to increase hardness. This treat they made, is more like a sorbet or Italian Ice. It has no milk or cream but it gets us started on frozen desserts. It is believed to have been introduced to Southern Italy by the Arabs, who also brought sugarcane to the country. They used mountain snow and fruit juices to make Sharbat, the ancestor to Italy’s Sorbetto and known elsewhere as sorbet or, indeed, sherbet.

Roman emperors enjoyed these types of desserts and it’s not for a few centuries during the Renaissance that we see the first gelato’s created. First we had to introduce sorbet to Europe, which is credited to Caterina de Medici who served it at dinners in France.

The rest of the steps are a great show of teamwork. Alchemist Cosimo Ruggieri gets credit for the first gelato flavor; the Fior Di latte. This means Flower of the Milk and is similar to Mozzarella and cheese. It uses no eggs, only milk and cream with salt and thickeners. Served cold after being churned.

The architect Bernardo Buontalenti then creates egg cream gelato; gelato alla crema d’uovo as well as creates advanced refrigeration techniques in 1565.

Francesco Redi and Lorenzo Magalotti made gelato famous by singing its praises and describing its ingredients. The tradition of producing milk based ice creams was carried to continental Europe after the wedding of Catherine de' Medici and King Henry II of France. From that moment, Gelato and the secrets of the Chinese and Persian ice creams spread across the Europe,

Lastly, The Sicilian Francesco Procopio Cutò made gelato available to all when he opened Café Le Procope in Paris in 1686 and started selling it to the public.He actually perfects the first ice cream making machine in 1686 which helps pave the way for common people to have access to make gelato and by the 1930s it starts being sold by stream vendors.

Italy may not have invented Gelato or ice cream but they have credit for advancing the first frozen desserts into the empire it is today. Their advancements and food ingenuity allows us to enjoy this creamy, flavorful, frozen treat all over the world.