The history of ice cream in Greece

Greece's first ice cream cones were the most delightful tingle to the palate. It only arrived in Greece in the 1930s, but its history is lost very deep in the past.

The evolution of ice cream dates back to ancient China, 600 BC., where the ice cream was known as "blonde ice cream" and was made using ice-boiled rice and thick milk.

It is recorded in the time of Alexander the Great (336 – 323 BC) as the gourmet Greek soldier enjoyed frozen (snow) fruit drizzled with honey.

A similar delicacy was tasted centuries later by the Roman emperor Nero (37-68 AD), who sent his slaves into the mountains to collect fresh snow and bring it back to enjoy with his fruit. He was probably the first person in the West to try ice cream.

Granitas from snow, juice and pieces of fruit were made by the inhabitants of Sicily, in a variation of the sherbets brought by the Arabs around 800 AD, when they occupied the island.

As many 16th-century travellers recall, Constantinople had warehouses always filled with snow for diluting sherbets while guests were impressed with dessert cups made of frozen fruit juices.

The invention of the first ice cream machine marked a turning point in the history of ice cream in Italy in 1846, the Italian gelato.

In Greece, in 1934, the first dairy industry was opened, and the first standardised ice cream was released. A characteristic image of this period was the wandering of itinerant ice cream sellers, who roamed the country's neighbourhoods and sold their frozen and sweet products, with children queuing up and fighting over who would buy it first.

This is how the ice cream cone entered our lives, having as an ally the endless delicious coolness.

By Alexandra Schinas, Admin of Writing about Greece

READ MORE: The Greek history of pizza that the Italians want hidden.