The World’s Most Expensive Ice Cream and How Much It Costs
How’s this for a dilemma: You have about $6,700 burning a hole in your pocket, and you can’t decide whether to spend it on a used car or a serving of ice cream. At that price, the car probably has a lot of miles on it, and you might need to set aside some extra money to get it into decent condition. But the ice cream is ready to eat, with no extra expense.
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In case you were wondering – yes, a serving of ice cream carries a price tag of about $6,700, or at least did about a year ago. Technically, it’s a gelato rather than an ice cream. But why quibble over semantics when you’re dishing out several thousand dollars for a frozen dessert treat?
As Food & Wine reported, the ice cream was made by Cellato, an “ultra-luxe” Japanese brand that called its gelato so good it will “delight even your cells.” In May 2023, the Guinness Book of World Records confirmed that Cellato set a new record for the World’s Most Expensive Ice Cream for 873,400 yen – or $6,696 at the conversion rate at the time. That dollar amount got you a single 4.4-ounce serving.
The ice cream is called “Byakuya” and includes the following ingredients:
White truffles imported from Alba, Italy
Parmigiano Reggiano cheese
Sake lees, a byproduct of the sake production process
If you want to know why it cost so much, the truffles are a good place to start. Those can cost nearly $15,200 per kilogram, according to Food & Wine. The ice cream is packaged with white truffle oil, along with a special handmade metal spoon crafted from the same materials used in certain Kyoto temples and shrines.
In its description of the pricey treat, Cellato calls it “a rich and mellow gelato with two types of cheese as a base and white truffle with a sensual and unique scent. The faint sweetness and gorgeous ginjo incense give the scent of white truffles a complex flavor. To finish, white truffles and Parmigiano cheese that look like snow are luxuriously placed and decorated with gold leaf.”
If you want to order some of the ice cream, here’s a tip shared by the Robb Report: If it arrives in “too frozen” a state, Cellato recommends letting the ice cream defrost at room temperature or microwave it at exactly 500 watts for 10 to 20 seconds. If you want to pair it with a spirit, it goes well with sake or French white wine.
On the other hand, if you’d rather buy a used car with your $6,700, be forewarned: That’s a very low price in today’s market. According to Edmunds, the average transaction price for all used vehicles in the 2023 fourth quarter was $28,371. A car that sells for one-quarter that price could be a clunker.
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