Everyone from Newark knows Nasto's, fictional mobsters included. In the Sopranos episode "Down Neck" — the reference is to a neighborhood, hugged tight by a curve of the Passaic River, better-known today as the Ironbound — Tony flashes back to a childhood memory. His father, "Johnny Boy" Soprano, is arrested one afternoon, under circumstances the young son is only beginning to understand, then returns home that evening, unruffled. "I stopped at Nasto's," Tony's father tells him, "got you some cherry vanilla."
Cherry vanilla is still a regular in the rotation, one in a lengthy list of ice creams, sorbetti, gelati, Italian ices, and sherbets. Over the intervening decades, as the old neighborhood has changed, new ice cream flavors have found their way into the mix: mamey and guava, green tea and red bean, dulce de leche and sweet corn (shown). True, these newer flavors part ways with tradition — but if young Tony liked corn on the cob, he would have enjoyed this corn in a cup, too.
Nasto's Ice Cream
236 Jefferson St. (at East Kinney St.), Newark, New Jersey
973-589-3333
www.NastosIceCream.com
