Gelato

Do I talk too much about gelato?  Maybe, but the only other things I can think to post about right now are 1) how I accidentally melted my suite-mate's coffee maker, 2) the sore throat that almost everyone on the program is suffering from, 3) the trip we took Saturday to Monte Sole, site of a horrific WWII massacre of women and children, where we were shown around by one of the few survivors, 4) the film we watched this morning that dramatized said massacre.

So gelato it is!

Today Speranza came into class with that by now unmistakable look of someone who has just had some amazing gelato.  She was really excited about the fact that she had finally had the experience of finding the best gelato in Italy (similar to the experience I had at Gelatauro).  Of course, we were all really eager to find out where she had been, and when she was finally able to pull herself together, she told us: Grom. 

I've passed Grom; it's a bit far from Forni, but definitely within walking distance. 

But you know where else Grom is?  Practically across the street from the NYU dorm I lived in this summer.

(note the sign for Bleecker street)

I felt kind of bad for having to break the news that the best gelato in Italy is also in New York.  But then again, maybe it's not.  Grandma Sandy's always telling me that she has all the food I blog about right in Boca, but is it really the same?  Speranza took solace in the fact the ingredients here are different, that this is the original, and I say that a huge part of eating gelato is the experience- when it's what would be considered dinner time in the US and everyone around you on the street is instead enjoying gelato with you, it just tastes better. 

I don't know if it's the same thing, but I've had a lot of Greek salads back home, and I don't think the tomatoes there were even the same species as the ones I had in Corfu.  I'll have to try Grom back in NY to compare gelati, but the other day, we met a couple from California that's currently on the last leg of a trip around the world that began last January (they saved up for ten years then quit their jobs).  Out of the 95 places where they'd stayed so far, we asked them where the best food had been.  They had the same answer I had come up with after covering only a tiny fraction of the globe.  Anyone still not convinced that they need to go to Greece?