Pregnant nuns shill gelato

The esteemed Daily Mail of London brings us news that Italian gelato company Antonio Federici has offended Catholics by using a pregnant nun, with the tagline "immaculately conceived," as its poster girl.  The firm "said the adverts celebrated the ‘implied forbidden Italian temptations’ of the ice cream," according to the article.  I can see how this might be offensive to Catholics, several of whom have had trouble resisting the forbidden temptations of, say, young male parishioners.  

USA Today names the top 50 ice cream destinations in America

My best friend Brendan once described USA Today as "an experiment in how much of the news can be expressed as a pie chart."  Journalistic quibbles aside, here's their rundown of the best ice cream parlors in America, state-by-state.  I'm already skeptical since their California listing forgoes Bi-Rite in favor of, well, who cares? Somewhere else.  So that can't be right.  How's their list, in your view?  Do you spot an error?  Is your favorite missing?  Do weigh in.

Artisanal ice cream hits South Korea

I can't say I'm very familiar with the Korea Herald as a news source, but for now I'll trust their ice cream reporting on good faith.  According to the paper, a couple of artisanal ice cream parlors have opened recently, including one that's owned and operated by a protege of les deux grands Pierres - Pierre Herme, author of Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Herme, and Pierre Marcolini, one of Belgium's top chocolatiers.  So if you're living in South Korea, life just got a lot better.

Photo: The Korea Herald

If you're fresh out of North Korea, like this preacher guy Jimmy Carter just rescued, life just got a lot better too.  If you're still in North Korea, life is most likely terrible - speaking of which, Harper's magazine has some fantastic reportage from there in their July issue.

Blue Marble's flagship will close due to rent hike

The Brooklyn Paper reports that the flagship location of Blue Marble, the organic, local-dairy, seasonal, yada yada yada ice cream parlor in Boerum Hill in downtown Brooklyn, will close because of a rent hike.  I wasn't overwhelmed by the ice cream, but it seemed like a sweet place and it's too bad it will close.  The story does a nice job of pointing out how Blue Marble was one of the first businesses to trigger that neighborhood's gentrification, and the irony of its being forced out because of said gentrification.

Why Sicily is the greatest place on earth: The Empire of Ice Cream

A gorgeous paean to Sicily and its tradition of gelati, by Mary Taylor Simeti, in Saveur.

Christopher Hirsheimer, from Saveur, issue 52

..."Sicilians took their ice cream very seriously, at all levels of society. In northern Italy, ices remained the preserve of the sick or the wealthy until the late 19th century, owing to the cost and limited availability of ice and other ingredients. But in Sicily even peasants considered ices their due. William Irvine, an English gentleman visiting there in the early 1800s, marveled that "wretches whose rags have scarse adhesion enough to hang upon their bodies, yet find a baioc [a coin worth less than a penny] to spend in the ice shop". The lackadaisical Sicilian legislators may have been described as an "ice cream and sorbet parliament" by King Vittorio Amedeo II in the 1700s, but these were men who knew their priorities: when in 1774 Palermo's supply of snow gave out, the parliament dispatched armed dragoons to Etna to procure more. The demand for snow was insatiable. It is said that during a ball given in 1799, likely for the Bourbon king Ferdinand and his wife, Maria Carolina, such a quantity of ices was served that their production required 11,000 pounds of snow."

A review of yesterday's ice cream social at the New Amsterdam Market

I had to work yesterday, and am furious that I missed the ice cream bonanza at the New Amsterdam Market.  Luckily, a writer named Brad Thomas Parsons from Serious Eats had a roundup, with Bent Spoon of Princeton, NJ, coming in #1.  Here's his review of Bent Spoon, find the rest here.

Heirloom Tomato-Peach sorbet.  Photo by Brad Thomas Parsons via Serious Eats

Featured Flavors: Fresh Ricotta, Bourbon Vanilla Sea Salt Caramel, Nectarine Sorbet
Bonus Flavors: Heirloom Tomato-Peach Sorbet, Concord Grape Sorbet
This wasn't a contest, but The Bent Spoon was the winner for me. From the super-friendly server who enthusiastically described the provenance of the wild grapes used in their sorbet, to their generosity with the samples. (Plus, they brought two bonus flavors.) I was tempted to cash in all of my ice cream tickets just to try them all. The Concord Grape sorbet was bursting with grape flavor and was one of the creamiest fruit ice creams I've ever tasted. And you had to love how they tipped their hat to the tomato tasting with their Heirloom Tomato-Peach sorbet, probably my favorite taste of the day.

Food writers reminisce about ice cream around the world, from Saveur

Photo: Christopher Hirsheimer, from Saveur edition 52

I just stumbled across this beautiful collection of vignettes from writers around the world, reminiscing about memorable ice cream run-ins.  I hope this blog becomes a wider, richer version of this kind of story.  Here are two of my favorites - and notice how the second one hints at the historical roots of the relative dearth of good ice cream in the UK, despite its renowned dairy industry.

Mexico: Frozen Dinner
The tropical ice creams of Puebla are so alluring that I once made an entire dinner out of nothing else. The meal began at Tepoznieves, a wildly colorful shop near the main square. My appetizer was fig ice cream dotted with bits of candied fig and spiked with mescal. The main course followed: tequila ice cream—as white as a cloud—with tangy passion fruit ice. The passion fruit was so refreshing that I had to have two more scoops. For dessert, I walked around the corner to La Flor de Michoacan for a Popsicle-like paleta of guanábana, or soursop, which tastes like a highly perfumed blend of apple and pear. Luscious. And for the road? A mango paleta, as nice a nightcap as I have ever had. —Barbara Hansen

England: Postwar Treat
I began eating ice cream in London in 1947. Ice cream distribution had been banned during World War II and for a time afterward, to save fuel, and it was consequently available only at shops where the owners made the ice cream themselves. Although the quality was rather poor, it tasted simply delicious to me. I'd go to such a shop and get a sandwich of two wafers enclosing a slice from a neapolitan brick; it was called a slider, because if you squeezed it too hard the middle would slide right out. The slider evolved from an earlier ice cream called the hokey pokey, a neapolitan slice wrapped in paper. The vendors who sold it were Italian, and they'd cry, "Ecco un poco" (Here is a little)—which, in the Cockney accent of the customers, became "hokey pokey". —Robin Weir

Baskin Robbins India launches Kulfi ice cream for the local market

Baskin Robbins is offering a kulfi ice cream in India to celebrate its 65th anniversary (as a company, I'm presuming, not as a presence in India).  The flavor sounds delicious - it will feature saffron, cardamom and cinnamon.  From the photo, it doesn't look like it will resemble a true kulfi, which is made with boiled-down milk and is usually much richer and heavier than normal ice cream, and is often served on a stick in a cone shape.  Still, I would eat it.

Obama loves Martha's Vineyard ice cream, reports USA Today

USA Today - known for their Beltway coverage - reports that Obama is "a big fan" of the ice cream in Martha's Vineyard, according to a White House spokesperson.

A modern-day tragedy, by Jeffrey Bowyer-Chapman

A modern-day tragedy, 2010, Jeffrey Bowyer-Chapman

Jeffrey Bowyer-Chapman is an actor and artist whose sharp eye and deep sense of empathy captured this image and called it out for what it truly is: a modern-day tragedy.  The random scattering New York City sidewalk debris echoes the sprinkles caught amidst the vanilla ice cream, and the drip attunes the viewer to the sense of time passing.  How long ago was there a screaming, crying toddler standing astride this fallen scoop?  Did she or he get another free scoop from a compassionate vendor?  One can only hope.