Scoop, there it is—the world’s priciest ice cream, that is.
Guinness World Records has crowned a Japanese ice cream the most expensive on the globe, thanks to its 880,000 yen ($6,380) price tag, CNN reported on Monday. That incredible dollar amount is in part due to the dessert’s star ingredient: white truffles sourced exclusively from Alba, Italy.
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“It took us over one and a half years to develop, with a lot of trials and errors to get the taste right,” a representative from Cellato, the brand that makes the ice cream, told Guinness World Records.
Technically, Cellato is calling the frozen treat a gelato, and its name—byakuya, or “white night” in Japanese—is a nod to its most notable ingredient. Along with the white truffle, which on its own can sell for as much as 2 million yen ($14,500) per kilogram, the dessert includes two types of cheese, edible gold leaf, and sakekasu, a paste-like item created in the process of making sake. To come up with the flavor, Cellato worked with the chef Tadayoshi Yamada, who oversees the French-Japanese restaurant RiVi in Osaka.
Those with the means to buy the ice cream will also receive a handmade metal spoon meant to be used for their enjoyment of the dessert. Cellato advises lucky tasters to pour in the white truffle just as the ice cream softens up. If it arrives to you in too frozen a state, the company says to let the ice cream defrost at room temperature or microwave it at exactly 500 watts for 10 to 20 seconds. And if you’re interested in eating your dessert with a little boozy accompaniment, sake or French white wine is recommended.
Cellato also sells a black-truffle version of its ice cream, and CNN noted that the brand is hoping to expand to flavors including other luxe ingredients like Champagne and caviar. While all of those items come with an up-charge, Cellato isn’t focused just on the price. The company said it’s working to combine European ingredients and traditional Japanese foods, opening up consumers’ palates to unique combinations.
A white-truffle ice cream certainly meets that bar, and it set a world record in the process.
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