A Day in My Kitchen: Developing a Gelato Cookbook from Scratch

A day in my kitchen looks different every single time. I go in with a list of what I want to get done, and it almost never actually happens in that order. Between running my business, working a full-time job, and going to school, finding real, focused time isn't always easy. A lot of building something from the ground up means facing rejection, silence, and no responses, more often than you'd expect. But you learn to just keep pushing, and one day you get to look back and say, it was worth it. (Fingers crossed.)

Some days it's testing a new gelato recipe from start to finish, I finally perfected my gianduia gelato recipe after a few tries, and now I'm moving on to refining my pistachio gelato, which I'll actually be working on right after I publish this post. Other days it's spent reaching out to photographers, trying to find the right fit for the cookbook, or sitting down to write, research, or design something for the brand. When you're building something on your own, there's always another thing to work on, but there's something genuinely rewarding about watching an idea slowly become something real.

At a certain point, I actually had to put website recipe testing on hold entirely and focus almost all of my energy on the gelato cookbook. With a schedule this busy, you have to choose your priorities, and I couldn't keep doing both well. That's part of why I started the Journal on my website, it let me keep sharing real content with the people following along, just in a different form, while all my hands-on kitchen time went toward the book itself.

There’s also the part people don't always see when they hear "self-published." It's not just recipe testing. I'm writing every word, designing every page, laying out the whole book myself, then going back in and changing things when I realize something isn't quite right yet.

Testing gelato specifically has taught me things I didn't even know existed, small details I never would have thought mattered until they did.

I remember the first time I made a batch. I was testing a ginger and yogurt gelato recipe. I honestly didn't think anything would go wrong, I figured it would just turn out fine. It didn't. It was icy, almost breaking apart when I scooped it. I remember feeling completely defeated, like this was a huge setback, like maybe I wasn't going to be able to write this cookbook after all.

But if I hadn't made that mistake, I never would have learned from it. Now, when something goes wrong, instead of feeling disappointed in myself, I've learned to just think, okay, what can I do differently next time so this doesn't happen again. It sounds cliché, but every single mistake really is a learning experience, and as a chef, it's what helps you grow, not just with gelato, but in everything else you cook too.

I'm hoping that when my cookbook comes out in the next couple of months, people genuinely enjoy it, and don't feel overwhelmed trying to make gelato at home, because it's actually so simple. As a culinary instructor, it’s important for me to help home cooks feel confident in the kitchen. People automatically think that gelato is difficult, but I’m here to show you that it’s actually really simple. It requires a little time and patience, but once you take your first bite you will understand why it was all worth it.

And a handful of real, minimal ingredients is all it takes, and anyone can do it and get real results in their own kitchen. You shouldn't have to feel guilty about what you're eating when it's made with real, honest ingredients. If people understand what's actually going into their food, it helps them make better decisions, and that, more than anything, is what I want this book to give people.

My first book, Pasticceria Umami: The Art of Italian Gelato, is where it all starts: a tightly curated collection of essential gelato flavors, made the traditional way, with recipes and techniques I've spent months and months testing and refining. It's Italian gelato distilled down to its purest form. But this is only the beginning. My second book will bring Japan into the story, weaving in the ingredients that have quietly shaped my cooking from the start. If you've followed along this far, you're not just watching me publish a cookbook. You're watching Pasticceria Umami take shape one book at a time.