GelatoSpots

Research edition

United Kingdom

London

Can a city with no ice-cream tradition of its own inherit everybody else's and still win?

London's ice-cream claim is inheritance, not origin: a Sicilian-immigrant ice trade that put a 'Little Italy' in Clerkenwell by the 1880s, and diaspora communities since — Turkish, Lebanese, South Asian — each keeping a separate frozen tradition alive rather than merging into a house style. The clearest current evidence is craft gelato made by people who trained or lived in Italy and then built small, single-site shops here: Jacob Kenedy's Gelupo in Soho (2010), and Ciprian and Iuliana's Gelateria Romeo & Giulietta in Stoke Newington (2017), named Time Out London's best ice cream parlour in the city in July 2026. Chin Chin Labs (2010) represents a different, homegrown thread — Europe's first liquid-nitrogen ice cream parlour, made in small batches in a Soho kitchen. The diaspora side of the claim is weaker than the Italian-lineage side: Southall's kulfi trade is real (Royal/Bombay Halwa, on King Street since the brand's 1973 UK founding) but is a wholesale confectionery brand's retail outlet rather than a single-site specialist, and no verifiable Green Lanes dondurma specialist surfaced.

Last checked 2026-08-21

The selected spots

3 selected

  1. 01

    Gelupo

    gelato · Founded by Victor Hugo and chef Jacob Kenedy

    A decade-plus, single-site Soho gelateria run by a named restaurant chef, independently and repeatedly ranked among London's best by Time Out's food editor rather than a listicle aggregator, with a specific, current (July 2026) flavour list attached to the ranking.

  2. 02
    A round tart glazed deep red and topped with raspberries, blueberries and small white spheresFrom Romeo & Giulietta

    Gelateria Romeo & Giulietta

    gelato · Ciprian and Iuliana (Romanian husband and wife, previously lived in Verona, Italy)

    A husband-and-wife, Verona-trained, single-site gelateria that makes its base and gelato on site daily and has just been named London's best ice-cream parlour by a named Time Out editor — the strongest current professional recommendation on record here.

  3. 03
    Chocolate sauce poured from a bottle over a swirl of soft serve in a branded cup, standing on a steel turntableFrom Chin Chin Ice Cream

    Chin Chin Ice Cream

    ice cream · Founded by Ahrash Akbari-Kalhur and Nyisha Weber (Akbari-Kalhur)

    A distinctive, single-technique specialist (liquid nitrogen, hand-churned to order) that pioneered the method in Europe and is still run by its founders fifteen-plus years on, with small-batch, named-kitchen production.

Research notes

City boundary

Greater London — the thirty-two boroughs and the City of London.