What Happened to Talenti?

In my early 30s, buying Talenti was a mark of adulthood,” former gelato evangelist Annemarie Conte writes. “Spending $5 on a pint of super-fancy gelato instead of a standard half-gallon of ice cream felt outrageous but worth it.” Then, in 2014, Talenti was purchased by a big corporation, and Annemarie’s love for it faded. She knew the frozen dessert had changed over the years — but how much? At the link in bio, Annemarie charts Talenti through the years — and tries a whole bunch of flavors to iTalenti is one of the most popular frozen desserts in the country. If the quality has changed, the American people need to know. We tasted nine different Talenti gelatos and sorbettos against other national premium brands to see how they stacked up. Vanilla really needs to be that pure vanilla flavor. And because there's no chips or chunks, there's nothing to hide behind. It was strangely sour. I looked at the ingredients list from over the years, and it turns out that they used to use vanilla pods, and then they switched to vanilla extract and seeds, and now they use vanilla "specks"? That might be the reason why the vanilla isn't as good as it used to be. With a mint flavor, you really want it to taste fresh and pure and refreshing. You don't want it to taste like toothpaste. Testers did not like the mint flavor. They thought it was foamy. They said it tasted like toothpaste and that it just was muddy and strange. These are not things you want in a dessert. The Alphonso Mango Sorbettto was a real bright spot in this taste test. It is bright. It is bold. It tastes like you're eating a mango. The texture was really good too. It was soft, it was easy to spoon. It really just it excelled in almost every way. Of the nine flavors we tasted, we didn't love four of them, and we did like five of them. The Talenti of my memory is delicious and premium and perfect. They were bought by a big corporation in 2014. Talenti was founded in 2003. And the ice cream landscape has changed. What people are tasting today doesn't feel as revolutionary as it did 20 years ago.