Colors Are Sweet in Chicago

Compulsions can be a funny thing.  Some people have a weakness for chocolate.  For others, it’s cars.  But for me, it’s color.  Be it in nature, design, food, I often find myself drawn more to the aesthetic appeal than the actual object. But that notion was challenged as I found myself torn between two loves: color and ice cream.

I recently attended the annual Chicago Luxury Ice Cream Festival, where I found myself among some of the most colorful and delectable creamy wonders on the North side.  Local creameries displayed their finest in the hopes of impressing ice cream lovers and gelato-holics alike.

In a crowd of eleven different creameries, two really stuck out.  The first was a vendor called Via Gelato and Café.  If you can imagine the bold flavor of kiwi, imagine even more the incredible green color that emanated from the delectable sweet. No additive colors were used to make the gelato. The color is the result of natures brilliance at its sweetest.

And Nice Cream – what a wickedly evil delight! Nice Cream is a seasonal ice cream shop which uses local and organic products to make flavors such as strawberry with angel food cake, vanilla bean with blueberry pie, chocolate with sweet basil and mango sorbet with chili powder and lime. Combine a wave of brightly colored crèmes packaged in equally appealing containers and color conscious admirers find themselves to be the proverbial moth drawn to the irresistible, epicurean flame.

The standards were high and at the end of the evening, this full time color enthusiast (and devout ice cream indulger) was left content in her compulsion.  The orange-peach champagne sorbet was orange at its best.  The bright yellow ice cream was the perfect pineapple.  I looked at the myriad of colors — the browns and oranges and pinks –and realized I could do nothing but enjoy it for all its splendor. Its sweet, bright and delicious splendor.