The Gelato and Grattachecca

My A-Z Challenge series is about Italy, it's lifestyle, the country and other miscellaneous things in regard to it.

Who doesn't love a gelato? So much nicer than the usual icecream we buy here in the UK. There are hundreds of flavours. Some of the gelaterias make their own speciality flavours, some are pretty unusual or perhaps crazy such as  Pear and Rhubarb, Ginger and Cinnamon, White Chocolate and Basil and also Ricotta Almond and Fig. I haven't tried any of those but will have a look out for them and have a taste. More usual flavours are Cioccolato, Nocciola, Mela and fragola (chocolate, nut, apple and strawberry).

You can buy it in a tub or on a cone and have two or three flavours, no less as that would be odd. With or without  panna which is the whipped cream piled on top. My absolute favourite gelato of 3 flavours is Pistachio, Crema and Caffe eaten from a cone, fairly quickly before it melts. I must have Panna as to me it's not a gelato otherwise.

A grattachecca on the other hand is not ice cream but flavoured ice. The vendour who usually works from a stall scrapes ices from a large block of ice, gratachecca actually means 'to scrape'. It's put into a tall glass and again, two or three flavours added these are syrups from bottles which you tell the vendor to add. You drink this through a straw. I tend to go for menta and orzo (mint and barley). This is really more of a specialty of the Lazio region not usually seen elsewhere. The bottles of syrup can be bought form shops so we always get one or two to bring home to make out own while not in Italy.

What's your favourite flavour ice cream? Have you tried a grattachecca?