Ice cream

I’ve been meaning to write a post about the more day-to-day aspects of living here in Venice for some time and have had a perfect topic in mind since just before Marnie arrived. It was to be along the lines of ‘Marnie and Robyn visit the best gelateria in town’, except that for whatever reason we haven’t made it to the yummy ice cream shop, so that one will have to wait. A certain NZ visitor to Venice (you know who you are) was quite particular about experiencing the finest cuisine which included ice cream, and it was suggested that I could take Marnie there too when she arrived.

 
Gelateria near our apartment – surprisingly quiet

In the meantime however, that particular gelateria (‘Igloo’ between San Marco and the Accademia Bridge) got me thinking about ice cream in general and of the sheer number of ice cream places there are in this town. It would be a slight exaggeration to say you stumble across their bright, gooey consistency every 100 metres, but not too wildly off the mark in the tourist-Mecca we traverse everyday between our apartment and the two venues.

 

Flava

It’s hard to say exactly what singles out a particularly gastronomical gelato experience from sight alone but in discussing the matter yesterday we came to the conclusion that the appearance of a fine gelato is less lurid in colour (i.e. more natural) and has less or no additional elements sprawled on top such as crazy biscuit things or lashings of chocolate syrup.

Ice cream bliss

Thoughts of plentiful gelaterie (plural of gelateria), led me to consider other multiples on view to keep the tourists happy and spending (or jaded and closed walleted). Two contenders of equal merit are the glass shops and the mask shops, my knowledge of which is limited to window glancing. Here I will let images speak as they have an immediacy that language might not quite do justice.

 

Glass treats

Stallion

Penguins

Masks

 

The Dali clocks…