The coconut is the fruit of the coconut palm, Cocos nucifera, a tree typical of hot countries, belonging to the Arecaceae family. With its hard, rough oval shell, the coconut is a sweet fruit, full of various nutritional properties, such as water, fibre, carbohydrates, sugars and lipids.
Generally grown in tropical countries, such as Thailand, India, and Indonesia, the coconut is sold either as the whole fruit, dried, soaked in milk, grated or grilled. Coconut is a perfect ingredient for various recipes, including cakes, frozen desserts and hand-made gelatos.
Coconut is a classic hand-made gelato flavour, perfect for the gelato parlour, especially during the spring and summer months. Sweet and refreshing, hand-made coconut gelato is a great accompaniment for chocolate flavours, but is also ideal when combined with hand-made gelato in various fruit flavours.
It is important to remember that if we use dried coconut for making hand-made coconut gelato, we can use smaller amounts of milk, which can in any case be used for making mouth-watering coconut sorbets or granitas.