Exclusive | NYC is Italian ice country and these five legends are steamy summers frozen chosen
Ice, ice, baby.Every New Yorker has an Italian ice hill they’re willing to die on — forget pizza, bagels or chopped cheese.
When the mercury hits 90 degrees, loyalties turn frozen.The rivalry isn’t just about dessert.It’s about neighborhood pride.Italian ice — inspired by Sicily’s granita and brought to America by Italian immigrants more than a century ago — has been a Big Apple summer ritual, like Mister Softee jingles and fire hydrants blasting open, for generations. For today’s Gothamites, grabbing one of these tongue-tingling treats isn’t about chasing a trendy dessert — it’s about honoring tradition, ideally after a day at the beach, or a walk around the block on a steamy night.The Post scoured the five boroughs to come up with five legendary neighborhood faves — try one or all of them before summertime runs out.
Across the Verrazzano, the Staten Island Italian ice icon has been cooling off New Yorkers for nearly a century.At Ralph’s Famous Italian Ices, the modest corner shop at 501 Port Richmond Ave.isn’t just another neighborhood dessert stop — it’s the birthplace of one of New York’s most recognizable Italian ice brands.The business traces its roots back to 1928, when founder Ralph Silvestro immigrated from Naples and began making Italian ice by hand in his Staten Island garage before selling it from a truck around the borough.
In 1949, he opened the Port Richmond storefront that still operates today.“My grandfather Ralph Silvestro came here to Staten Island from Naples, Italy as a young man and started making Italian ice in his house’s garage, the old-fashioned way,” co-owner Larry Silvestro told The Post.Silvestro said Ralph’s continues to make its fruit flavors with real cane sugar and real fruit, including lemons, oranges, mangoes, guava, cantaloupe and strawberries — a tradition dating back to his grandfather’s earliest “granita” recipes.While the company has expanded to more than a dozen locatio...