Piccomolo Italian Ice Cream

I love gelato, and with all rage about froyo I forgot how much I enjoy the density that gelato has.
One night recently, my gf was having a bad day and I wanted to cheer her up with Ice cream so we came here. The place is still tiny, and filled mainly with families but it’s one of the closest options for gelato.
I had bubble gum, banana cream pie, and birthday cake. I liked all the flavors but really enjoyed birthday cake!

We had a treat Sunday night, two of us. We split the medium size cup, we had three flavors for a little over $ 4+ a bit pricy but taste is pretty good. We had the sea salt caramel, mint chocolate chip and panecota. This is not a baskin robins type of place or a blue bell flavored place. Service was good. Pretty packed when we got there but it cleared out pretty quick. Surprisingly this location (not sure about others) stays open till 10pm on Sundays. This was out second time back to this location. We will be back.

As the 3 stars imply — A-​OK.
Pros —
Staff is friendly. Large sellection. Nice display. Clean. I enjoy the amount of flavoring… not bland, not extreme… just right.
Cons —
Portions seem small for the price. Sometimes I will get ice crystals in the ice cream, which to me tells me that it was not fresh. But sign says made fresh daily. I don’t like being lied to. I used to make ice cream for a living… trust me, it is not all made that day!
With this in mind, I still go here because of the location and they are friendly and I love their Salt Caramel!
Hope this helps.

The gelato is great and the staff is nice.

They have a good selection of a variety of gelato. I tried the Cappachino & chocolate chunk one. It was delish. Boy does gelato fill you up even though those large cups aren’t really large to the eye.

I’m not sure what all of the other reviewers are talking about… authentic or not. Piccomolo has yummy gelato! I recently tried their sugarfree versions, chocolate and hazelnut… they were delicious as well. A few months ago, I also ordered one of their custom birthday cakes and it was awesome. I highly recommend Piccomolo if you’re looking for some yummy gelato.

What the heck happened to Piccomolo?
I first tried Piccomolo a few years ago at a location in Spring. That location has since closed. Having a serious gelato craving one day, I drove to the FM 1960 location near my parent’s house. I get there (mind you I’m crazy enough to drive from the Heights to Copperfield for ice cream) and discover that they were out of business as well. I ended up going to the Meyerland location, which I had gone to once before, with a friend later that same evening. I chose 3 different flavors and not one of them was really something to rave about. The texture was extremely icy, which I’m aware gelato in general has more of an icy texture in than ice cream, but there was no fluffyness at all. My guess is they had all been sitting in the freezer for quite awhile and not made fresh that same day as advertised. The flavors were not at all impressive either and one of my choices was the classic Rocky Road — how do you mess that up? I almost never dislike Rocky Road. In fact, I think this was the first time. The chocolate was so flavorless.
I can get better gelato than this at Coffee Groundz or Nundini, and they are both much closer to home. No wonder their franchises are going out of business left and right.

I’m indifferent to ice cream most of the time. It’s not my go to dessert when I want dessert but other times I just want to eat ice cream non stop. Well my friend always suggest we go here when we go out so I’ve been here 2 or 3 times. It’s pretty far from where we live but my friend thinks its worth it! I’ve had gelato at some other places and compared to those, Piccomolo’s was good. It just tastes like any other place I feel like. I think just getting some Blue Bell for much cheaper (and much more ice cream) would be a better bargain!

So, the word «authentic» is a slippery word under the best of circumstances, especially in the USA, the great assimilating machine. The melting pot. Let’s face it, the point of that metaphor is that in the end, we’re all the same. Which would be fine if we didn’t go spreading our sameness back all over the planet from whence we came in the first place. But, alas, this is the case.
But the word «authentic» gets especially tricky with anything Italian. The Italians have a reputation for being, let’s not beat about the bush, lazy perverts. And, as a person with not an insignificant amount of Italian heritage, I can admit this is not entirely without merit. But we live in a day and age that is apprehensive about such pejorative language. So, revising this national identity for contemporary tastes we might say that Italians are not easily motivated, but once motivated, their passion borders on maniacal. We are a lusty people, lulled into a more temperate state by one of the most idyllic climates on the planet. Displaced from this climate, our passions run rampant.
Evidence: The Ferrari, The Lamborghini, The espresso, Prosciutto, Balsamic, fashion, the affair and gelato. As far as the Italians are concerned, if it is worth doing, it is worth completely overdoing to the point that no one else can see the point of even trying.
Italians have an undeserved reputation for being lousy engineers. That generalized sense of laziness somehow translates into not being able to build things correctly. The mechanical shortcomings of Fiat and Alfo-​Romeo somehow completely eclipsed monumental feats of engineering such as the Ferrari, the Lamborghini, the espresso maker and the gelato machine.
And so, at the heart of «authentic» Italian is not so much a result, or a technique or even list of ingredients, but mostly an attitude ~ if you’re going to bother to get out of bed and not waste the afternoon watching girls walk by on the piazza, you might as well do whatever it is that has you so fired up to the point of rendering it Art.
Now. Piccomolo is not «authentic» even in this sense. But I seriously doubt you will find gelato anywhere outside of Italy that really is. Something about setting foot on the shores of this continent sucks just enough of that artist trapped in a lazy, lusty engineers body out of a person that it just never quite happens. This is how pasta pomodoro became noodles drowning in red sauce. This is how some of world’s finest cheese ended up in a can with holes in the top. This is how Lamborhinis ended up getting designed by Belgians with German engines.
On the other hand, the man who is running Piccomolo in the evenings clearly loves what he is doing, or I cannot possibly imagine why he would bother. And that has to count for something.
Tonight I sampled the hazelnut and found the texture radically improved from the other evening. My goal is still to find a flavor that is both present and not over sweetened, but that may take some time, especially given American tastes. But with this shop not too far from home, I could see Piccomolo becoming a habit.
After all, it was good enough to get me off the couch and out of the house twice in one week, wasn’t it?

Perhaps it is because I’m not a gelato snob, but I find this place delightful and refreshing. I appreciate everything from their perfectly creamy and delicious gelato to the friendly staff to those eco-​friendly recycling bins near the entrance. And let’s not forget about the free wi-​fi.
To me, ice cream in general is either a bit too rich or too sweet or both. Piccomolo’s creamy gelato creates a delicious and relatively healthy balance between the two.
My favorite flavor so far is the classic chocolate. Birthday cake, hazelnut, and donatella are good choices as well.
Their price is on par with general ice cream places and cheaper than Ben & Jerry’s, but it’s more than worth it if you split a large cup with a friend!

I find Paciugo at Buffalo Speedway and 59 much better in both the quality of the gelato and the store. I really don’t like sitting in the Piccomolo store.

My family is from Italy and I have yet to find a place that is real «gelato» in this city. Piccomolo does an OK job at trying, but by no means is it anything like a true gelato. The flavors aren’t very promising and the taste is rather hard and icey instead of soft like a regular ice-​cream. If you’re looking for an ice-​cream stick to the real American stuff like Marble Slab or something of that nature.

Stopped in here this afternoon on the way home. Wanted to compare another near-​town gelato place to Paciugo. As Katie F stated, «solidly decent rather than extraordinary.» Kind of a snooze fest actually.
Across from Meyerland Plaza, the shop means well but the flavors are a bit blah. I had the kids’ cup (2 flavors for $ 2.49) with pistachio and amaretto chosen to provide a benchmark. For $ 3.99, you can get three flavors. A posted sign says that they make the flavors fresh every day.
The pistachio was very bland with hardly any hint of nutty flavor — a sprinkling of crushed pistachios would have been welcome, too. The amaretto fared better — it had higher flavor notes and was something that should be the baseline for the other flavors.
The store is cute and cozy — you probably couldn’t get more than 10 people in it at a time.
I hate to say it but Piccomolo pales in comparison to Paciugo. It is an okay place but spend your cash at Paciugo for better flavors and more of an urban chic environment.

After the explosion of gelato places in Houston in the last couple of years, it’s easy to have a favorite. Piccomolo is a good addition, but I’d describe it as solidly decent rather than extraordinary.
The gelato kind of reminds me of ice cream at Coldstone Creamery: at Coldstone, the flavors are muted to focus on the flavors of the mix-​ins. At Piccomolo, the flavors are muted too, but who wants a mix-​in with their gelato?
Donatella (chocolate hazelnut) is good, but flavors are way more intense if you get the same thing at Paciugo. Strawberry Kiwi is a nice palette cleanser, and it’s on par with some of the other places. Sugar free chocolate is way too icy (to be expected). Texture of all the flavors is smooth and enjoyable.
All in all, it’s good if you’re having a serious gelato emergency and you’re near Meyerland, but if you can stand to drive about 10 minutes further, head over to Paciugo by the Kroger’s on Buffalo Speedway.