The chemistry of gelato

Davide Cassi is Professor of Physics of Matter at the University of Parma, where he directs the Gastronomic Physics Laboratory. For over thirty years he has studied food as matter, applying physics to understand culinary transformations and to create new gastronomic processes and products. Between 1995 and 1998 he invented liquid-nitrogen gelato, now widespread worldwide. In 2002, with chef Ettore Bocchia, he originated Italian scientific haute cuisine, opening a path of collaboration between research and fine dining. In 2006, at Cantine Aperte at Carpenè Malvolti in Conegliano, he made for the first time a gelato obtained solely from bottled wine, without milk, eggs or base mix. Crystallisation, emulsions, foams, gels and phase transitions are his research fields; through Future Cooking Lab he transfers this knowledge to innovation in the food industry and restaurants. In recent years he has opened the front of computational gastronomy, applying network science to recipes, historical cookbooks and culinary systems. He is a founding member of the International Society of Scientific Gastronomy and vice-president of the Science and Cooking World Congress, and teaches every year at the Universitat de Barcelona. In 2013 the Académie Internationale de la Gastronomie awarded him the Grand Prix de la Science de l'Alimentation; in 2026 the International Bergamot Academy appointed him Ambassador. His most recent book is Pasta cruda, pasta cotta (Maretti, 2025).

Stefano Guizzetti founded the gelateria Ciacco in Parma in 2013. Its ingredient list excludes anything not already naturally present in the raw materials used every day in the shop. The knowledge gained during his degree in Food Science, together with research and experimentation, led to the first Italian artisanal gelato free of any food additive, natural or artificial — the subject of a university scientific publication. In 2014 the project grew with a shop in the centre of Milan, in via Spadari, the so-called 'Via del Gusto'; in 2024 the 'Laboratorio Urbano' opened in Milan as a new centre of production, experimentation and innovation for both gelato and pastry. A lecturer at ALMA, Accademia Barilla and many training centres, he works with leading chefs' associations, restaurateurs and food companies as a master pastry and gelato maker. Over the years his pairings have become ever more refined and original, with new lines from large leavened products to viennoiserie, from creams in jars to fermented products. A member of the Italian Association of Ambassadors of Taste, he has held Gambero Rosso's Three Cones since January 2017 and was named Italy's best gastronomic gelato in 2019; since 2023 Ciacco is also in Identità Golose's guide to Italy's best restaurants. In November 2024 he received the MAM award as Master of Art and Craft; in December 2024 and 2025 Ciacco was named Italy's best panettone by Dissapore (second for Gambero Rosso), and in June 2025 and June 2026 Italy's best gelateria by Dissapore.

“I come from a family that has specialised in the dairy sector for three generations. That allowed me to see, and to take an active part in, the processes of producing, transforming, preserving and distributing milk.” Towards the end of the 1970s, alongside his main business, Arnaldo Conforto began keeping bees. Passion and curiosity would lead him to experiment with everything that wonderful world has to offer. In 1990 the opportunity arose to open a café and gelato shop, and he devoted himself to it completely. He bought everything the literature of the day had to offer on the subject, and found his bible: “Scienza e Tecnologia del gelato artigianale” by Luca Caviezel. In 1997 he asked his son Flavio to transfer Luca Caviezel's recipe-formulation scheme into a spreadsheet. So Gerigel was born, software for formulating and managing recipes, which together with Caviezel's book would later become teaching material at the Scuola Italiana di Gelateria. “Experimenting and sharing led me to meet colleagues and masters. Giuseppe Lancerini proposed that I join the Accademia della Gelateria Italiana. In 1998 I became a full member.” Slowly the need to found a school for the sector took shape. In 2007, with other colleagues, he took part in founding the association “I maestri della Gelateria Italiana” and subsequently in setting up the Scuola Italiana di Gelateria, based in Perugia. He taught there for the whole of the school's active life. In 2012 he obtained the professional qualification of Specialised Master Gelato Maker awarded by the Umbria Region, and the qualification of Judge “Level I Sensory Analysis”. In 2010, with his children, he founded the company Artigiani del gusto. He still works in training and consultancy for colleagues and for new businesses. When A' Nivarata, the Sicilian granita festival, was born in Acireale, he accepted the coordination and production of the laboratory, assisted by Ruben Pili, with whom he would work until it closed. “I remember with great affection my friend and colleague Giorgio De Pellegrin, who the day after the first edition of Sherbeth said to me: Arnaldo, this is the finest artisanal gelato event I have ever seen; we must be there and support these two ‘visionaries’. After some time Antonio Cappadonia invited me to help Giorgio run the Sherbeth laboratory. That is how my unbroken path as head of the Sherbeth laboratory began.”

Born in 1966, journalist, graduate in political science, lifelong Inter supporter raised in Milan: he began his career in 1992 in Umbria, which is now his home. He started as a film critic, but the call of the palate soon prevailed and he chose food and wine. For many years he contributed to L'Espresso guides and has always worked with Identità Golose. In 2017 he founded and still edits James Magazine, a bold and innovative periodical born of an editorial vision rooted in the pursuit of absolute quality and a long familiarity with great Champagne, fine wines and signature restaurants. Sparkling wines have always been central to his work: a passion that became a language and a way of telling stories. Since 2025 he has also edited Sparkling Life, a bimonthly devoted to the effervescent world, and since May 2026 Portraits, the print magazine of Champagne Society, entirely dedicated to Champagne. He also directs the first World Guide to Roman pinsa.