I come from a small town in the south of Italy called Alezio. My home town is located in the region of Puglia with our nearest large city being Gallipoli, which is famous as a fishing town. The whole region is blessed with sunshine nearly 365 days a year. Growing up in this wonderful area with my 5 brothers and sisters, ice cream is a way of life for us, like in many parts of Italy. Children, adults and grandparents will regularly visit their favourite ice cream parlour at least once a week and in the summer it becomes a daily ritual.
When I moved to England in 2004, two were the things that were always missing here: the great Mediterranean seafood and real homemade Italian ice cream. Well, I couldn’t do anything about the seafood, but I could about the ice cream, so my brother Andrea and I set our sights on opening our own ice cream parlour in the UK.
Bournemouth is a great seaside town. I had visited the town a few times and loved the feel of the place and of course its amazing beach. Finding the right location was key and when we saw the shop in the Burlington Arcade we knew it would be perfect – big enough for a few tables, and also a great atmosphere. After 4 weeks of hard work we opened on the 15th May 2008.
We Italians take food very seriously, and ice cream is no different. We make our ice cream every day on the premises using local dairy products and incorporate fruit that is in season and available locally, and obviously flavours from around the world. If you love ice cream as much as we do, drop in and try our ice cream – I am sure you will not be disappointed.