Gelato di yoghurt e fragole – yoghurt strawberry gelato

I have always been gelato-obsessed. In summer here in Melbourne I try to limit myself to two gelati a week. When I am in Italy, the story is a bit different as I am often sight-seeing and walking, so it can becomes two each day (in summer at least). I know it is a lot, but (as I tell my husband), it has calcium so it is good for me! When my zia Clara was alive (mamma’s sister), she would always make sure there was a litre-tub of gelato from the local Gelateria (ice-cream shop) in the freezer when I went to stay with her in Monfalcone. It often contained my favourite pistachio and coconut gelato and I would invariably eat the one litre tub in the first two days. I told you I was obsessed! I love how now in Melbourne at both Pidapipo’ and Gelato Messina you can buy tubs that shop assistants will fill with whatever flavour combination you want to take home (just like being in Italy).

I went to the tennis at the Australian Open today and it was so hot. All I could think of was eating gelato once I got home, next to a fan. I had bought a punnet of strawberries at the market that morning, so I planned to make strawberry yoghurt gelato. This is my “go-to” simple and quick one hour gelato recipe – no eggs, no overnight chilling. You do of course need an ice cream churner; when I first made this recipe, I had one of the cheaper ones that you keep in the freezer and it worked beautifully.

This recipe is perfect for those hots nights when you feel like gelato but there is none in the freezer. You only need three ingredients for the basic yoghurt gelato – caster sugar, cream and good quality full cream plain yoghurt. Add fruit like strawberries, berries, ripe peaches or ripe bananas and you will have a fruity yoghurt version. Try experimenting – Just think whether the fruit you have would taste nice with extra creamy sweetened yoghurt, and if the answer is yes, then try it! You might need to vary the amount of add sugar to different fruit varieties, but the quantities are essentially those in the recipe below. It is that simple! I like to throw on some chopped fruit and serve immediately.

For those of you who have been reading my blog for some time, you might remember that last year I won ITALY Magazine’s Food Blog of the Year. As a follow up to that, I was contacted by ITALY Magazine and asked to do an interview, submit an article and be their featured blogger. I was just thrilled to have been asked! Both were published this week and lots of lovely people read the article and then visited my blog. How I love these virtual connections of like-minded people. Click here for the interview and here for the article, which is a recipe for frittole Triestine. I made frittole last weekend with mamma in preparation for the article in ITALY Magazine and took several photos of her in the kitchen cooking. She had forgotten the recipe, it was so long since she had made them. So we looked at hand-written notes she had and worked it out. I hope to post these plus put the frittole recipe on blog some time later this year.

Links to other gelato recipes (these ones are a touch more complex though):
Dulce de leche gelato
Gelato allo zabaglione