Eating Out: Ciao Gelato

This is the last of my catch up posts before I can start blogging about my Molly holiday adventures! Though I am by no means up to date with posting all of the food I have been eating out over the past year, I have just at least posted the ones that I visited during Molly's stay. This post concerns one of my greatest joys in life - ice cream!

I had long heard about the amazing vegan options at Ciao Gelato in Nundah. Trouble is, Nundah is not exactly near me! But finally I was able to get out there one day. I visited another vegan friendly cafe for lunch (I'll talk about that in a future future future post), but for dessert it was always about ice cream!

Not everything is vegan, but they always have several vegan flavours (fruity sorbets but also some other options, flavours vary), a variety of vegan chocolate covered pops, vegan brownies, vegan sundaes, and... well, you'll see at the end. The best bit is that for the most part they are not coconut cream based! The sorbets are water based (and yet... so creamy... so magic)... or rice based, and sometimes nut based. Hurrah! On, and those cones at the bottom of the case are all dipped in vegan dark chocolate!



To start with I had a vegan Chocolate Cherry Pop. Think chocolate sorbet with cherry fluff in a dark chocolate shell. Yes please!



They also have a selection of vegan brownies, which you can have as is or turn into a brownie sundae (yes, they have vegan hot fudge sauce). Extravagant! I didn't try any of these, I just contented myself with admiring the brownie case.



I needed to sample as much as I could manage, so for my second course I decided to go a more refreshing route with their amazing passionfruit sorbet served in a dark chocolate dipped cone. This was so creamy and fruity, with the perfect sweet yet tangy blend of passionfruit flavour. Oh my heart, I want it again!



I live a good half an hour away even when using a toll road, and it was a pretty hot day, so while I was enjoying my first and second treats they had put something very special in the blast chiller for me. I needed it to be rock hard to survive the trip home, which it did! You may have noticed something in the lower corner of the cabinet and wondered what it is. I teased a bit earlier that they had something very special, and here it is.



A vegan Peanut Butter Cookie Dough Ice Cream Cupcake. Peanut Butter. Cookie Dough. Ice Cream. Cupcake. Let that just sink in. What magic is this? Why, it is a dark chocolate cup filled with ice cream, topped with salty peanut butter, and finally crowned with some chocolate chip cookie dough. What sweet heaven has descended upon us? They have some other flavours as well, but I don't know why anyone would choose something that doesn't involve this combination. Peanut butter for life! Here is an inside shot!



Nundah is also home to several vegan friendly cafes, so even though I won't be stopping by too frequently (just not a place I ever actually go near in my regular life), I can definitely make a case for stopping by every now and then for lunch and ice cream! If you are visiting Brisbane and are into ice cream, I would certainly suggest making the trip out to try this place. I'll drive! After all, taking a visiting friend for ice cream is an excellent reason to get myself over that way.

Ciao Gelato - 1/1207 Sandgate Rd, Nundah, Brisbane - 0479 036 947

Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



Big Dim Sim update ahead! But nothing terrible. Wednesday was a big day for my baby girl. She had her senior check and vaccination. For the first time in forever, she was quite wiggly when they were taking her bloods! Silly baby. Then there was a problem with one of the blood tubes when it got to the lab, so we had to go back to get more! I have been worried that her kidneys were going to be quite a bit worse, but they are actually fairly stable, maybe slight progression if anything at all. She is also medicated for an overactive thyroid, and her results (we even did an extra special test to confirm) show that her current medication dose is likely a bit too high. So we are reducing her dose and rechecking in a month. She is now on the tiniest dose of thyroid meds ever! She is maintaining weight though, which is good. She is a tiny eater, and is on appetite stimulants to keep her weight up. She is happy to eat her dry food, but fussy about her wet food. So we have started blending her k/d stew tins up into a slop, and she loves it! Slurping it down!