Restaurants

Perfect parlours Feature continues

Gelateria Valerie
Sweet, light gelati – just like the gelateria of Rome – are made on the premises at this spacious café-cum-kiosk. Our cherrissimo contained impressively juicy cherry pieces but the pecan-toffee flavour would have benefited from a few nuts. Two scoops in a jewel-coloured plastic tub cost £2.50, sundaes are £5.75.
Gelateria Valerie, Duke of York Square, SW3 4LY (020 7730 7978) Sloane Square tube.

Häagen-Dazs
The company’s cafés provide new routes to ice-cream excess. Their Midnight Panna Cotta Cone (£6.15) contains a scoop each of panna cotta and chocolate midnight ice-creams, plus cookie chunks, plus raspberries and banana, plus coulis – and don’t let them forget the fresh cream.
Häagen-Dazs, 14 Leicester Square, WC2H 7NG (020 7287 9577) Leicester Square. Branch: 75 Hampstead High St, NW3 1QX (020 7431 1430) Hampstead tube.

Inn The Park
Oliver Peyton’s upmarket park cafe has just started serving its own ice-creams. Flavours include English strawberry and clotted cream, and rhubarb and custard. They can even be made up into glammy sundaes (see picture opposite). Also on sale are Jude’s ice-creams from Hampshire – butterscotch crunch, ginger spice and strawberry tease. Expect to pay £2.50 for a small tub.
Inn The Park, St James’s Park, SW1A 2BJ (020 7451 9999/ www.innthepark.co.uk) Green Park tube.

Marine Ices
The Manzi family’s traditional gelateria-restaurant serves around 25 mambo-Italiano flavours such as tiramisu, amaretto, tutti-frutti, pistachio plus, of course, chocolate and strawberry. Prices start around £1.50 for a single scoop. Take a seat in the vintage pizzeria restaurant for coupes and knickerbocker glories.
Marine Ices, 8 Haverstock Hill, NW3 2BL (020 7482 9003) Chalk Farm tube.

Morelli’s Gelato
Harrods is always trying to make its products more exclusive than its competitors’ and ice-cream is no exception. Morelli’s Gelato counter in the food hall, which produces fresh ice-cream daily, is now offering a bespoke service. Phone in your order 24 hours in advance and it will custom-make whatever flavour you like, with a minimum order of 1 litre. The service costs £12.45 plus cost of ingredients.
Morelli’s Gelato, Ground Floor, Harrods, 87-135 Brompton Rd, SW1X 7XL (020 7893 8959) Knightsbridge tube.

Noura
Noura’s a rapidly expanding chain of Lebanese brasseries and cafés, not an ice-cream parlour, but you can drop in any time you like to try its outstanding ice-creams. The consistency is dense and creamy, encouraging the intense flavours to linger: rosewater, milk and orange-blossom, mango, ashta (Lebanese clotted cream). £4.75 for one three scoop portion.
Noura Brasserie, 16 Hobart Place, SW1W 0HH (020 7235 9444/ www.noura-brasseries.co.uk) Victoria tube/rail. Branches: 122 Jermyn St, SW1Y 4UJ (020 7839 2020) Piccadilly Circus tube; 16 Curzon St, W1J 5HP (020 7495 1050) Green Park tube; 2 William St, SW1X 9HL (020 7235 5900) Knightsbridge tube.

Oddono’s
Piedmont hazelnuts and Valrhona chocolate are the typical calibre of ingredients used in Oddono’s authentic gelati (pictured above). Even the equipment used at the South Kensington parlour is imported from Italy. But you no longer have to travel to Bute Street to get your fix – Selfridges has installed a handy counter in its food hall serving cones and tubs. Prices start around £1.50 for a single scoop.
Oddono’s, 14 Bute St, SW7 3EX (020 7052 0732) South Kensington tube. Branch: Selfridges, Ground Floor Food Hall, 400 Oxford St, W1A 1AB (020 7318 3721) Bond St tube.