Gelato Festival, Spitalfields
This weekend sees six of Italy's finest gelato masters descend on London for three days of pure indulgence in Old Spitalfields Market - I'm just a little bit excited as a) I love gelato, and b) I'm going to be a judge there, YES. I'm going to be trying them all as the Italian big boys battle it out to find the ultimate gelato master.
Gelato is serious business for the Italians and its a completely different beast to standard ice cream as we know it. If you'd like to know more, then take a look at this piece I wrote for the Londonist on the best gelato in London. Essentially though, its far more of an art form (they even have University courses devoted to becoming a gelato master) and must be freshly made every few hours; served slightly warmer than ice cream; have a superior density and as such a finer melt and flavour delivery.
Spitalfields Market will be playing host to the Italian National Gelato competition winners, so its fair to say that there will be some fairly good gelato on offer - some of the chefs have reputations for being pretty experimental and apparently there are going to be some savoury flavours and all sorts of cheffy pairings to try.
If you'd like to come and try for yourself, grab a ticket here (its cheaper) and allows you five scoops on the day You can buy on the day but ideally they want to pre-sell gelato cards, they’re a tenner and you get 5 scoops plus an extra one if you vote for your fave. Go go go!