The icy treat can be traced back to 1200BC and Mesopotamia, with early versions invented all over the world – Alexander the Great was a fan – but what we know as ice cream today emerged in the 1500s to 1600s, according to the head of Italy’s Gelato Museum. Photo: Gelato Museum The icy treat can be traced back to 1200BC and Mesopotamia, with early versions invented all over the world – Alexander the Great was a fan – but what we know as ice cream today emerged in the 1500s to 1600s, according to the head of Italy’s Gelato Museum. Photo: Gelato Museum
The icy treat can be traced back to 1200BC and Mesopotamia, with early versions invented all over the world – Alexander the Great was a fan – but what we know as ice cream today emerged in the 1500s to 1600s, according to the head of Italy’s Gelato Museum. Photo: Gelato Museum
Food and Drinks
Lifestyle /  Food & Drink

The history of ice cream, from iced slush to vanilla cone – but was it invented by the Chinese or Italians?

  • The first ice cream was more of a slush than a paste-like flavoured cream, says the head of Italy’s Gelato Museum in Bologna
  • The turning point came during the Renaissance, when such frozen drinks became the modern, paste-like gelato we are familiar with today

Topic |   Food and Drinks
Silvia Marchetti
Silvia Marchetti

Updated: 11:07am, 18 Jun, 2020

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The icy treat can be traced back to 1200BC and Mesopotamia, with early versions invented all over the world – Alexander the Great was a fan – but what we know as ice cream today emerged in the 1500s to 1600s, according to the head of Italy’s Gelato Museum. Photo: Gelato Museum The icy treat can be traced back to 1200BC and Mesopotamia, with early versions invented all over the world – Alexander the Great was a fan – but what we know as ice cream today emerged in the 1500s to 1600s, according to the head of Italy’s Gelato Museum. Photo: Gelato Museum
The icy treat can be traced back to 1200BC and Mesopotamia, with early versions invented all over the world – Alexander the Great was a fan – but what we know as ice cream today emerged in the 1500s to 1600s, according to the head of Italy’s Gelato Museum. Photo: Gelato Museum
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