Gelato Messina

I'm going to let you guys in on a little secret. I'm not much of a sweet tooth. But before you scoff with disgust and pledge never to read my blog again, I should tell you that the one sweet thing that gets me every time is good ice cream. And I'm not talking about this pishy-poshy froyo shit, I'm talking about the real deal. Perfectly creamy, deliciously flavoured, wonderfully whipped ice cream. So when I heard that Gelato Messina was finally opening it's doors in Melbourne I was, well, lets just say I was pretty pumped. And, given the massive queues since it's opening, turns out the rest of Melbourne was just as excited as me.

Opening it's doors in Darlinghurst in 2002, Messina has now moved toMelbourne, alongside the dive bars and up and coming restaurants of Smith Street. It maintains 40 signature flavours that have all been perfected, including white chocolate and salted caramel (their biggest seller...gee, I wonder why), chocolate fondant, pear and rhubarb and the more adventurous chocolate and pandan. They also have weekly rotating specials that will delight and encourage you to step out of your comfort zone. I've always been a big chocolate ice cream fan, so I couldn't pass up the milk chocolate with peanut butter (try it or be a desperately sad, sorry person for the rest of your life) and a scoop of the special, 'cremino', which was vanilla ice cream with chocolate chunks, salted caramel and amaretto biscuits. Now, I'm not one to exaggerate, but this ice cream has literally, literally changed. My. Life. The flavours were rich and actually tasted like their ingredients, the chocolate was creamy, the peanut butter perfectly salty and the amaretto biscuits crunchy and delicious. From first bite you can tell that this ice cream is made with love. Everything is made from scratch at Messina, meaning that when you order a scoop of 'apple pie' ice cream you're eating home-baked pie, and don't even think of uttering the words 'preservatives', 'flavourings' or 'colourings' within earshot of this gelateria. When I questioned my ice cream companion about his flavour choices, he described it as (if I recall correctly) 'sex in my mouth'.

So if you're wondering if the hype about Messina is worth it. Stop wondering. It is. If you're thinking 'ppshh, it's just ice cream, what all the fuss about?!' then you must try it. The ice cream is so good in fact, that when I typed 'Messina' into Google Translate, it could not give me an english word to define it's excellence. Google Translate has spoken-this ice cream is literally indescribable.