Pidapipó - gelato in Lygon St.

Last night we went to see a film at the Nova, had a pasta in one of the Lygon St. eateries, and then decided we wanted ice cream. And so we came to Pidapipó just before Ti Amo. There was a queue, loud music was playing and the queue seemed to be all young urban hipsters. We were about to turn away when a personable young man told us that the ice cream was delicious and the queue very quick moving. I immediately suspected a spruiker - which indeed he turned out to be, but nevertheless we were suckered in and spent ten minutes queuing for an ice-cream. Every time it looked like we were wavering he ambled up and chatted us up - and others too, though eventually he just sat down in the shop and talked on his phone - well did something on his phone anyway.

Was it worth it? Well it certainly was very smooth and creamy. I had a coffee flavoured ice and it was very coffee flavoured. But whether it was so much better than any of the other excellent ice cream you can buy on Lygon St. or, indeed, anywhere else, I'm not sure.

I was pretty disappointed by the options. This is a menu I found online, which is obviously old because they now cost $4.80 for one scoop. The toppings and the adffogato and frappés are still the same and the flavours on offer are very similar. I don't think the nutella swirl was there - and I believe that is a speciality - with a dash of hot nutella on top. I don't remember seeing sticky date pudding either. Really the rest were pretty mundane flavours. I chose coffee but thought about salted caramel. In sorbets the choice was very limited - I remember mango, watermelon and lemon but can't remember if there were others. There were peaches lying around in the shop but I definitely don't remember anything made with peaches.

The other disappointing thing to me was that the ice-cream was not on show. You could not see it until they were scooping it out because it's kept in "stainless steel pozzetti, which keep the temperature of the gelato constant so it doesn’t freeze, melt and refreeze." You can see them in front of the staff in this picture.

The owner is Lisa Valmorbido (I think she's the one in the centre front - so quite young) who took herself off to gelato university in Bologna, gained her degree there, worked in Vicenza for a while in a gelato shop there and eventually came back to Melbourne, where she set up a pop-up with her brother in Carlton. It was a success and so they set up the current store. They now have two others - one in Windsor and one in Degraves St. in the city. All very urban hipster.

I don't doubt their dedication. According to their website there are fundamental rules to which they adhere.

"All gelato must be made from scratch on site.

Small batches only. There is no good gelato without great ingredients.

Fruit is fresh, never frozen with no artificial flavouring, ever.

All recipes must be precisely calibrated to create uniform creamy texture and intensity of flavour."

However, I do question whether it is all worth the fuss - and the wait. The store itself I saw described as funky but here it is - and to me it just looked messy - very ordinary looking shelves packed with boxes of cones and tubs, boxes of fruit lying around on the counter top. Not really super attractive. And it was packed - on the left is a photo that David took of the customers finally reaching the counter. They work hard at creating that funky atmosphere and the staff are definitely quick and pleasant but I find the spruiking off-putting and, as I said, the store itself, is, to my ageing mind anyway, pretty mundane.

They also make ice-cream cakes by the way but you have to order them three days in advance.

It is a prime example of how you create buzz though. I'm guessing it owes a lot to Instagram and Trip Advisor which has it highly rated. I suppose it was sort of fun waiting in the queue. It reminded us of another buzzy ice-cream shop we visited in Rome. Also a very long queue, but they were a bit slower at moving the queue and the staff were not as friendly when you got to them. More choice in flavours though. I mean if you came here a lot you would quickly work through the repertoire. But then people are a bit conservative probably with ice-cream and have their favourites.

Anyway we can boast of having a pidapipó ice-cream. The name, by the way, is the name of a sort of Simon Says game they play in Italy.