There are few food items more universally loved than ice cream. So you’d think writing a book that combines delectable photos of the frozen treat with a personal travelogue would be a slam dunk of a project, right? Well, it was actually a long slog and a labor of love for local author and gelato-holic Steven Simpson.
Long before Instagramming your food was a thing (or more like a law nowadays), Simpson was traveling around the country and documenting his passion for ice cream. Sometimes with a real camera, no less! Over the course of seven years, he visited 174 different ice cream emporiums in the U.S., Canada, France, Spain, Hong Kong, and Japan, and took hundreds of pictures, which he shared on his Facebook page.
Like many amateur food photographers, he heard from lots of friends urging him on. “You should write a book,” they said. Unlike the rest of Instagram Nation, Simpson actually acted on the idea and formed his own publishing company and embarked on a voyage toward publication. An ultimately unsuccessful Kickstarter campaign demonstrated that there was at least some sincere interest in the project, if not a line of investors waiting to pour some money on the fire.
Undeterred, Simpson plugged along and began working with local designer Christa Schoenbrodt to create an extremely attractive 224-page tome, really more of a coffee table art book than just simply a travel journal. Page after page of colorful scoops and cones are accompanied by Simpson’s impressions and recollections of the circumstances around each visit.
He does sneak a few non-frozen items or hybrids like ice cream sandwiches, macarons and profiteroles in the book, but who can judge him for sharing more of his passions? The back of the book features a geographical index in case readers would like to replicate part of Simpson’s journeys or find a good recommendation in say, Wichita or Hong Kong. One small quibble with the organization is that cities and states are both listed in the index, so you might have to search in Nashville or Chicago in addition to Tennessee and Illinois. It’s a book that’s worth reading from front to back anyway, so you’ll get to see them all.
The Ice Cream Gypsy is available from that huge online store named after a South American river, but I strongly encourage you to shop for a copy at East Side Story, where proprietor Chuck Beard has been a strong proponent of the project, as well as an important cheerleader for many Nashville authors. Grab a scoop and dig in!
