Conti’s Ice Cream at the Great Taste - Welsh Winners event in Cardiff

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The Great Taste Awards - 

Welsh Winners Showcase 

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Written by Hazel Thomas - 'Mama Cuisine'

What a pleasure to be at the Great Taste event in Cardiff, at the St David’s Hotel, promoting one of my all time favourite products Conti’s Ice Cream. This award winning Ice Cream (which is a secretly guarded recipe) has been a firm favourite at the Cafe on Harford Square for many years. And now Tom, the 5th generation of the Conti family is the new keeper of that recipe. Tom however has in the past few years, since 2012, been developing his own range of flavours to compliment the sublime traditional Conti’s Ice Cream and to his credit ‘the boy done good’, or ‘a chip off the old block’ if you like, with that cheeky combination of Conti and Lewis blood bringing a new generation of Ice Cream producers to the much loved and respected Conti family and cafe in Lampeter.

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And what an event we had. Prospective buyers from all around Wales and the UK came along to the stand to sample the Ice Cream and the pleasure on their faces needed no words to express what I knew they were tasting. Our very first visitor was none other than the legendary Nigel Barden who talks food and recipes on the Simon Mayo Drivetime every Thursday between 5 and 7. No need to ask if I listen to his slot with pleasure and delight, Is the Pope a Catholic? Anyway it was as much as I could do to remain professional as I watched him sample flavour after flavour of the Conti’s ICe Cream. Of course he loved the Ice Cream and was so very interested in the wonderful story of the Conti brothers who walked over from Italy in 1933 to bring wood to sell to the mining industry, saw the lack of cafe’s and never left,but you can read all about the Conti history on the website so I won’t go into detail here. Working with Tom and Heulwen, Tom’s girlfriend was an added bonus. There was a quiet and confident bond between them which can only be described as a shared passion and commitment to promote Conti’s Ice Cream to the world. Hey! and if it was good enough for Mick Jagger back in the 60s, on his rare visit to Lampeter, how can they possibly go wrong!

Wales has a great reputation of producing first class food and boy oh boy, here in Ceredigion, we are truly spoilt for choice, so the next time you visit Lampeter why not drop in and see the new look Conti’s Cafe and treat yourself to a Salted Caramel, Strawberry or Caramel and Honeycomb Conti’s Ice Cream, to name but 3 of the 6 award winning Ice Creams. You will not be disappointed I promise you and perhaps you might even be tempted to have a coke and ice or a cup of Affogato!