The White Truffle Ice Cream With A Record-Breaking Price Tag

Would you pay $21 for a smoothie in Los Angeles? What about $69 for a lobster pizza in New York? How about one small, fancy serving of Japanese gelato for 880,000 yen? That's $6,103.74 in U.S. dollars as of publication.

Cellato, a Tokyo-based company, sells fancy, expensive gelato made with a fusion of Japanese and European ingredients. It won the Guinness World Record for the most expensive ice cream on the planet on May 18, 2023, for its Byakuya ice cream. This gelato is made with Italian white truffles, sake lees, two types of cheese, and gold leaf. It is shipped in a small glass jar with truffle oil and a spoon made by artisans in Fushimi, Kyoto. To eat the ice cream, Cellato recommends waiting until the hyper-frozen dessert is soft enough to easily put this spoon into it after drizzling the frozen treat with the accompanying white truffle oil. If it's too hard, Cellato (perhaps blasphemously) says you can put it in a 500-watt microwave oven for 10–20 seconds. Cellato pairs the gelato with a full-bodied sake, chablis white wine, rum, grappa, sweet sake, vinsanto, or pommeau de Normandie to match the flavors of the treat.

The primary reason Cellato's Byakuya gelato is so expensive is because of the Italian white truffles it's made with. A fungus that grows in the ground in forests and looks like a rock, a funky potato, or a brain, white truffles are known as the "diamond of the kitchen," first described as such by Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin in his 1825 book "The Psychology of Taste". White truffles are earthy and a bit musky, but with a hint of allium sharpness reminiscent of garlic or shallots. They're a bit woodsy and nutty, and those who have had them often say they're intoxicating.

White truffles from Alba, Italy, are notorious for being the best and, consequently, most expensive truffles on the planet, but similar white truffles can be found in Oregon and are also starting to be harvested in Appalachia. Scandalously, some white truffles are sold as Alba truffles but are actually from Croatia. In a good foraging year, 1 kilogram of white truffles costs $2,000; in a scarce year, they can go for $6,000. Cellato says its Italian white truffles were purchased for 2 million yen per lot, or about $13,800 USD.

According to Cellato, the gelato is made with "plenty of white truffle" and "two types of cheese," including a dusting of Parmigiano Reggiano. The combination of white truffle, dairy from grass-fed cows, and nutty, earthy cheeses creates a flavor quite different than a pint of Ben & Jerry's chocolate chip cookie dough. Depending on the age of the Parmigiano, it could lend either notes of fruit and yogurt or deep, savory nuttiness.

The ice cream also uses sake lees, the mash of rice, yeast, and koji left over once the wine has been pressed out. Also known as sake kasu, sake lees are a popular ingredient in Japanese cooking, imbuing dishes with a sweet, mild umami flavor when used. Between the truffle, cheese, and sake lees, this ice cream is an umami flavor bomb.

Byakuya is a tribute to craftsmanship. The ice cream itself was finely tuned under the eye of the head chef of Osakan restaurant RiVi, Tadayoshi Yamada, known for his imagination with fusion cuisine. To get the balance just right, Cellato told Guinness World Records it took a year and a half of trials. Even the spoon it's shipped with is a high-end product, crafted by artisanal metalworkers responsible for the decoration inside and outside shrines and temples, and made of the same materials. The whole thing really earns its gold leaf.