Creating Laugther

News just in...Everyday when we produce wonderful artisanal batches of gelato in our Wisconsin Ave shop, we are actually creating a lot more than just something to eat. heehheehe. We have a photo to prove it.

The word roots: gelo-, geloto-, gelato-, gelat- come from the Greek word for "laughter"/"laughing". (from http://www.wordinfo.info/words/index/info/view_unit/889/?letter=G&spage=1)

and "gelatology" is the study of laughter
(http://www.geocities.com/laughterdynasty/evaluation.html) (http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/biology/b103/f01/web2/chaudhuri.html)

All above data are compliments of the man himself, Jason Orfanon. Thanks Jason!
& Thanks Elisabeth for the beautiful photo!

More Blood Oranges

Blood Oranges - Blood oranges are juicy, sweet and have a dark red interior and are slightly less acidic than regular table oranges . Originally from Sicily the blood orange has gained in popularity in the US and can be found fresh or in juice form in many grocery stores. www.gourmetsleuth.com

I spun a beautiful batch of blood orange sorbetto this week. It has the most amazing texture, taste and color. I love working with fresh fruits. I can already feel the spring and summer coming around the bend, when our shop converts into an aroma filled party with fresh fruits arriving everyday. Come on peaches, apricots, cherries, nectarines & plums! They will start coming in very soon. This year we are going to get a lot of these fruits from Frog Hollow Farm in California. I have never eaten a peach more divinely sweet and juicy. I cannot wait to work the other fruits. You don't want to miss our shop this spring and summer, actually you should never miss our shop, or you might miss all the new flavors we are contsantly spinning out. This week we did a heavenly Dark Chocolate, a Milk Chocolate Passion Fruit, a White Chocolate with Rasperry, a Fresh Spearmint with Honey and a Wild Flower Honey (a squeeze of lime juice, a drop of orange juice and lots of wild flower honey). There is no end in sight of the creativity, the art, the pureness and the freshness. This is the best part of the process, because we are always creating something delicious and new.

Blood Oranges

Beautiful, juicy, sweet, red and orange Blood Oranges. That's right. Recieved this weekend. They are just now beginning to ripen up which explains the mix of orange and red in the pulp. They will continue to get more and more red until the end of the season, which will be around the March timeframe. I am trying to control myself from eating them all or giving them all to my friends. This Friday I will be spinning up a wonder-full batch of Blood Orange Sorbetto. Light, fruity, smooth,...TO BE CONTINUED...

Our little cafe Tryst

There is nothing like waking up and peering out the window to 8 inches of snow. That's just what happened last Saturday here in DC.

To accompany this dreamy scenario is our little cafe Tryst. She is parked on 18th street NW, right in the heart of Adams Morgan, about a 3 minute walk from our apartment.

It is the place we go to lounge, read, eat, drink wonderful artisan coffee, all the while sinking lower & lower into their comfy hand-me-down sofas that scatter the open garage style space. Just about a week ago, I noticed the barista emptying a bag of Counter Culture Coffee into the grinder hopper. The barista, Mike told me that they had switched over to CCC a couple of weeks back. Wow! CCC is a wonderful artisan roaster in Durham, NC and we use their beans for our espresso drinks in our lovely gelato cafe, Dolcezza. It just makes our neighborhood cafe all the better. There are few things in life better than a carefully pulled shot of espresso. I guess it is like all things and the fact that there are levels of experience within each, like wine, cheese, chocolate, gelato and pretty much everything we do.

Dulce de Leche musings

Cream being added to our dulce de leche gelato mix. The sweet warm aroma that fills the kitchen makes us all smile :)

Marvelous Dulce de Leche. Argentine gelato at its finest. We import a wonderful artisanal dulce de leche and mix it with a dark Stracciatella. The combination is warm and complex as the dulce de leche unfolds through flavors of burnt, creamy sweetness, then finishes off with the rich dark chocolate taste of stracciatella. It makes me realize that most of the others out there hawking their dulce de leche ice cream are not really making dulce de leche. They say that it is the same as caramel, to which I reply, "who stole your pallete?" You gotta try it to see what I am talking about.

Summer 06

Here we are on the verge of our first snow storm & I am already thinking about our shop come summer-time, when all the fruits began to fall from the trees. We are so excited about the Frog Hollow harvest - fresh peaches, cherries, apricots, nectarines, pears & plums. Good Lord, I will probably not be seen for the first several weeks of the harvest, as I will be buried in the basement formulating fruit.

La familia

Little Milena, Violeta's niece. How could I not put this picture on our site. This is about as cute as cute gets. Look for future pandemonium amoungst los chicos.

Our little shop

Stoned...Immaculate. Opening day - 21.July.04

Them summer days...

The Secrets of Pistacchio

For those of you who have never tried our Pistacchio, here's our little secret.

We use REAL Pistacchios! There, now we've gone and done it. If it ain't REAL, we don't want it. So, there, now you know our little secret.

Ode to the Passion

A little while ago when I chanced upon Dolcezza, I accidently walked in on our Cassis making it with the Passion Fruit. No one was fired or anything, but it definately left its' mark on our innocent little shop. Now we all follow the Passion Fruit around, just to see what she'll do next.

Gelato Transcendence

Stubblefield contended that as long as methods were available that allowed people to dissolve the ego and kill time-not while away the time, not pass it, but annihilate it-they would seek out those methods regardless of the risks involved. The ecstasy of living completely in the present moment, which almost everyone experiences briefly in sexual orgasm, mystics access during deep meditation, shamans savor as a reward for their psychedelic ordeals, and some artists stumble upon gratuitously when they lose themselves in their work, that egoless euphoria was, according to Stubblefield, at the core of transcendence, the liberated state of elevated innocence for which every human animal unwittingly hungers. Transcendence was, quite literally, heaven on earth... -tom robbins, villa incognito.

hmmmm....nothing to do with gelato, but, hmmmmm....