Hello questers,

Drew here, with a belated post on Angelato. In the past week, KDay and Mel have increasingly been accusing me of being a 'bad guest-quester' and have threatened that unless I posted vit-vit, I wouldn't be enjoying any quest-related goodies anytime soon. So that got me off my rear (on the couch), on my feet, and back on my rear (at the computer desk).

Both KDay and Mel have waxed poetic at length about Angelato and I have to say that I fully support everything they have said about the place so far. During the quest, I had two roles. First, I took photographs of the occasion. Second, I loaded up the handy-dandy notepad function on my iphone and took notes on the things KDay and Mel said as we took in the atmosphere and took in the gelato. I therefore, present to you, the original "questing notes". Mind you, these were written on the fly. When KDay and Mel get to talking about gelato, they don't stop (except to eat more gelato). That means I had to type as fast as I could just to keep up, and as my iphone made auto-corrections, I didn't bother to go back and fix them.

Quest

Oct 15

It's like a fall harvest (cider)

I didn't even need to tell thou. It tastes

just like a reward pent butter cup

Consistency is perfect light and fluffy

Were coming back here

This is like the best hilarious I've eve

had

Drew you've picked the right gelato

quest to come on

3 dollars for a perfect portion

Kday got a penutenutter and original

chocolate

Mel got cinnamon and pumpkin pie

Drew apple cider and mocha crunch

Mocha flavor is not overlee coffee

It was worth the drive

This has been delightful absolutely

delightful -Mel

"Gelato is the fine wine of frozen desserts"

All right readers, first I have to clear my name. I was the driver that made the wrong turns, the u-turn in the construction zone, and who executed the "pretty poor parking job." Thanks for throwing me under the bus, questing buddy. BUT, the getting lost was not my fault (my navigator gave me faulty directions), the police officer in the construction zone could not have cared less about my u-turning, and the parking job was as good as could be expected when there was freaking gelato to be eaten. Ahem. Back to the real purpose for my post, which is to wax poetic about the tastiest gelato this side of Firenze.

To start: the flavors. On the left, we have kday's cup of peanut butter straciatella gelato (on top) and chocolate gelato (hiding). In the middle is Drew's cup with apple cider sorbetto (on top) and mocha chip gelato on the bottom.  On the right, we have my fall-themed choices, cinnamon (on top) and pumpkin pie (hiding). Kday already gave you her thoughts on her flavors and I don't want to steal Drew's thunder, so I will try my best to stick to my own flavors here but - let's be honest - we did a lot of sharing.

I've never been sure how I feel about cinnamon flavored things (the fault of Big Red gum) and have always felt that cinnamon lends itself better to warm items than to cold ones, but the woman in front of me in line had just ordered a whole quart of cinnamon gelato, which made me think it must be pretty tasty. So I ordered it. After my first bite, I knew that my feelings on cinnamon had changed. Do you know how sometimes, when you're eating inartfully made apple pie, you can feel the cinnamon specks on your tongue? And how when there's too much cinnamon in something, you feel the immediate need to brush your teeth? This gelato wasn't like that at all (obviously). It was smoother than smooth, not too sweet, but also not too cinnamony. It made me envy the Eskimos and all those words they have for ice - there just aren't any words in the English language to describe how delicious this stuff was. And then I got to the pumpkin pie gelato, which had two equally delightful parts: pumpkin gelato (again, perfect consistency, not to sweet) and bits of actual pumpkin pie. The whole thing was an autumnal explosion. Delicious.

The thing that really set this gelato apart from the rest of the stuff we've tasted (even more than the quirky yet perfectly executed flavors) was the texture. Angelato says: "To enjoy your gelato to the fullest, try pulling your spoon through the product. At the correct serving temperature your gelato should be soft enough that you can do this easily, but not so warm that it is melting." I dragged my spoon through my gelato and it was perfection. The death-by-chocolate at Piattini was too runny, kday's chocolate peanut butter at Piattini was too cold, and all the stuff that dripped all over our pants in the north end was also too drippy. Angelato though, true to their educational materials, had the perfect texture. I'll never be a wine connoisseur, but I will be a gelato connoisseur - Angelato also says that "gelato is the fine wine of frozen desserts."

So thank you Angelato. Even though I am a disaster who can't park and who gets lost on Greenough Boulevard and breaks laws with impunity in front of police officers, you came through for us. You are the clear winner in my book (pending completion of the quest, but probably the clear winner anyway).

Oh - I almost forgot. Each cup cost three dollars.

Yeeeaahhh!!!

Angelato: To be enjoyed with gusto!

On Friday, Melanie and I along with our guest-quester, Drew, went to Angelato in Belmont. After making a few wrong turns, including a U-turn in a construction zone in front of a police officer and suffering through a pretty poor parking job, we arrived at our questing location. Immediately upon entering this gelato shop, we were in love.

Staring into the gelato case full of deliciousness, we couldn't decide what to order. After sampling the pumpkin pie and cinnamon gelato, it was so good that we decided we needed to organize. It was decided that the three of us all needed to order different things in order to maximize the number of flavors we could try. This was a good quest to have a guest-quester because we tried 6 flavors. I ordered peanut butter cup stracciatella and chocolate. Melanie chose pumpkin pie and cinnamon, and Drew ordered apple cider and mocha chip.

As soon as we started eating, Drew seemed surprised by our enthusiasm and our ability to wax poetic about gelato. My peanut butter cup stracciatella tasted exactly like a Reese's Peanut Butter cup in frozen form. It was divine. There were good size pieces of chocolate and streaks of peanut butter in a nice vanilla-based gelato. When I shut my eyes and ate the gelato, it was like tasting peanut-butter and chocolate heaven. I'm not exaggerating even in the slightest. The chocolate gelato was also delicious. It tasted like a fudgesicle and had a very smooth consistency. Our dedicated readers will know that nothing will ever top Piattini's dark chocolate magic, but this gelato had a solid, original chocolate taste that didn't disappoint. It was on par with Rita's.

As I was shoveling my gelato choices into my mouth with a colorful and appropriately sized spoon, I noticed a laminated placemat that had the history of Angelato's gelato and expressed the establishment's love for Gelato. Angelato's mission statement is now officially adopted into the gelato quest: Whether the flavor be traditional Italian, otherwordly exotic, or home grown American, we always remain true to the artisan tradition of producing products with love that are intended to be enjoyed with gusto.

As we sat in Angelato's, we enjoyed our gelato with gusto. Because we loved this place so much, each quester (even our first guest quester!) will write their own comments about their flavors. Get excited for what awaits you, as I described Drew's apple cider gelato as tasting like a fall harvest and Melanie's cinnamon gelato mixed just the right amount of warmth and heat into this cold dessert.

Belmont is a bit off the beaten path, but trust us---run (or drive), don't walk to this delicious gelato shop. You too can eat gelato with gusto!

The Polls are Closed

Despite the fact that the polls say they are open for another 80 days, they are now closed. Why? Because Melanie and I said so. We are the questing czarinas, so we do what we want. Plus, we don't really anticipate getting many more votes. I guess only 20 or so people read this thing. But that is neither here nor there because the important thing is that chocolate chip cookies won. This will be a delicious quest, and Melanie and I are equal to the challenge. Thank you for your participation. Also, we are thankful that chowder did not win. How could we possibly make an entire blog about fish soup? Our comments would be limited to the following: too fishy, not enough fishy-ness. That would have been a boring blog. We are confident, however, that we will have lots of say about cookies.

Below are the possible locations for our chocolate chip cookie quest. The list is subject to change and will likely be trimmed down to 8 locations. Any suggestions for the final list would be appreciated.

Clear Flour Bread

Flour

Boston Chipyard

Kilvert and Forbes

Rosie's Bakery

Quebrada

True Grounds

Hi-Rise Bakery

Parziale's Bakery Inc.

Sweet Tooth Boston

Burdick Chocolates

Even though our next quest is taking shape, we still have a few more gelato shops to sample and we are headed to Belmont on Friday to try Angelato. We are confident that we will accomplish our goal of completing the gelato quest before the first snow, which is important because even though we support gelato-induced brain freezes, we dislike eating gelato when the temperature is actually below freezing.

Cafe Paradiso

On Thursday, Kday and I met in the North End to test Cafe Paradiso's gelato. We arrived at the cafe to find several men speaking Italian and watching sports on television. It felt pretty authentic even though the decor of the cafe oscillated between sporty:

(Go ... Albania?) and seriously strange:

For those of you who are confused, this is part of a (real) tree with witches hanging on it. I know we're in Massachusetts and I know it's close to Halloween, but I just don't know how I feel about this bit of decor. There was also a fully stocked bar (seven flavors of limoncello anyone?) staffed by a middle-aged Asian bartender, which you just don't see a lot in the North End.

We sat down and received menus. We asked the waitress how many flavors we could get per order and she told us that there was only one size available and that it included three scoops, each the size of a golf ball. Twist my arm. I ordered Nocciola (hazelnut, per tradition), cappucino, and vanilla. Kday, in a leap of faith, had chosen tiramisu (which looked a bit pre-chewed) and "cookie creme" (which looked like cookies and cream ice cream but only if you were squinting). For her third scoop, Kday asked the waitress for her favorite flavor. The waitress recommended, "zuppa inglese," which contained vanilla gelato, rum, strawberries, and panettone. Kday paid no mind to the fact that the name means "English Soup," which sounds revolting, and includes several ingredients that don't sound like they belong together. Bold choice, questing buddy.

Despite small-but-metal spoons and whimsical parfait glasses, our gelato surprised the heck out of us for being not three golf ball sized scoops, but three baseball sized scoops:

Whoa, nellie. Talk about ruining your dinner.

The vanilla gelato had a nice consistency, but it was nothing to write home about. Gigi is still the winner on the vanilla front. The cappucino was delightful and, according to the menu, award-winning. The nocciola was the best I've had yet. I thought, after Athans, that I would be morally opposed to non-smooth hazelnut gelato, but the nocciola at Cafe Paradiso proved me wrong. While the Athans "chunks" were really some species of almost-but-not-quite pulverized hazelnut, the chunks in this nocciola were real chunks and were, therefore, acceptable. There was also some sort of caramel ribbon, which was a nice counterpart to the chunks.

Kday's tiramisu was excellent, despite looking pre-chewed. It wasn't too boozy but still had a rum flavor and tasted like a gelato version of the real thing. The "cookie creme" tasted "like a blended oreo" and therefore got rave reviews from the chocolate monster who ordered it. The third scoop, the mysterious zuppa inglese, was our least favorite in the dish. It tasted a lot like rum (in addition to ruining her dinner, kday risked getting seriously sauced with two baseball-sized scoops of boozy gelato) and the cinnamon in the pannetone clashed horribly with the strawberries. Blech. Way to lead us astray, otherwise-nice-waitress.

Despite our best intentions, neither of us succeeded in eating our own weight in gelato. Even though we didn't clean our dishes, we were feeling pretty good about the whole experience. And then we got the check. The menu didn't include a price for the one-size-only gelato serving and, what with being so overwhelmed by the decor, we didn't ask the waitress either (mistake).

So when the check came and we each owed $6.98 (plus tip) we were understandably peeved. What gives, Cafe Paradiso? You expect us to pay $7 for the only size of gelato you have? Without telling us? And when your flavors include boring ones (vanilla) and gross ones (english soup)? And when you're hanging witches from a tree next to our table? If it weren't for your tiramisu and your nocciola, I would bite my thumb at you. As it is, I'm quite miffed and probably not coming back. If we do come back, Kday and I will share one dish of gelato and there's nothing you can do about it. And your English Soup flavor is gross. So there.

Reader Poll!

We're almost at the halfway mark of the gelato quest and have turned our minds to the next adventure. Please vote one for one of the options in the poll (right above the "Followers" link).  If you vote for "other," please leave a comment to this post explaining your brilliant idea.

By way of information, our hot chocolate quest would be loosely based on this one from the Boston Globe (but without the $42 chocolate bar, sadly). The donut quest would resemble this list provided by Lynne S. on Yelp. The chocolate chip cookie quest and the chowder quest would be up to our imaginations (and yours) since no one seems to quest for these things.

But mostly, dear readers, we want your help in brainstorming the perfect next quest (or three). We're ready to do this once a week for the rest of the school year, so we need lots of ideas. Our questing criteria include (1) cheap and (2) delicious. With that in mind, cast your votes!

Rita’s Café: A Hidden Gem in Brookline

Yesterday afternoon, Melanie and I continued our tradition of ruining our appetites for dinner by eating dessert first. We quested to Rita’s Café in Brookline, and immediately upon entering the shop, we knew one thing: we would be coming back.

When we walked into the quaint coffee shop, we were kindly greeted by a man who spoke limited English. It didn’t matter. He fully understood that we wanted gelato and he was quick to get that gelato to us. After looking into the display case and pondering one scoop or two, Melanie and I both made our orders. Melanie ordered one scoop of chocolate and one scoop of raspberry, and I got one scoop of chocolate and one of vanilla. We both tried to get one scoop, split into two flavors, but this was lost in translation. But it didn’t matter—as we soon discovered the gelato was delicious and two scoops a piece was perfect. He took our orders, and we waited at the counter for gelato, but then, he directed us to take a seat. We followed his kind orders, and we found a table in the charming and nicely decorated shop. This place even has an exposed brick interior wall. We soon saw him bringing out gelato to us in glass polka-dotted bowls complete with real, metal spoons, and we knew that Rita’s was one classy establishment.

We dug into the gelato with enthusiasm and with the best spoon yet. It was ¾ of a normal spoon size and metal, whereas all of the other spoons to date were cheap and disposable plastic ones. Melanie’s raspberry tasted like sorbet, rather than a true gelato. It had a strong flavor and an intense raspberry color, and she was pleased with her order. The gelato was light and almost fluffy, but she did long for a more creamy consistency. We both ordered a scoop of chocolate, and both of us were very pleased. Melanie aptly described the flavor as “an intense fudgesicle.” While no chocolate gelato will probably ever compare to the dark chocolate heaven we ate at Piattinis, if someone wanted a true and original chocolate, I would direct them to Rita’s. Both of us ate ever last bite of the chocolate gelato in our dish. My vanilla gelato was just average. It tasted just like ice cream. It was creamy and had a vanilla flavor, but it did not have the flavor intensity or lightness that I so enjoyed at GiGis.

After we had eaten to our heart’s content, it was time to pay. Paying for this gelato further confirmed to us what a delightful spot Rita’s Café really is. Two scoops cost just $3.50 a person. While paying, another employee asked Melanie and I if we would like a sample of a new milkshake they were making. The recipe was still in the experimental stage, and he wanted our feedback. We obviously accepted the offer, and we slurped down our chocolate, peanut butter, and banana milkshake offering him all of our thoughts (less peanut butter, more milk, use smooth peanut butter rather than crunchy). Good thing Melanie and I are so opinionated! He really took our comments to heart and after thanking them profusely for the gelato and the bonus milkshake, we got on our way.

Now, no post about Rita’s Café would be complete without this piece of information. Rita’s does not make their gelato onsite; rather, they buy it from Sapori di Napoli (that place in the Northend that was closed last week when we tried to go there). Learning this made Melanie and I very excited to go to Sapori di Napoli in the near future, and we have promised not to repeat any flavors on that quest. Even though we cannot score Rita’s on their gelato making ability, the shop gets perfect scores for its ambiance and the experience as a whole. We both want to go back and get lunch or dinner from this café and then order some gelato for dessert.