Lancaster County has an amazing assortment of wonderful, quality eateries. Perhaps it has to do with the tourism, maybe the colleges, or maybe it is because we are accustomed to fresh, wholesome food here. Whatever the reason, it would be hard to beat the options available here.So, it was a sort of challenge for the brother-in-law, after returning from a trip to Italy, to find real gelato. He traveled far and wide, scootering over all of the neighboring counties looking and sampling, never finding quite what he was looking for, until one day....
Maryanne and I rode past Ciro's Italian Bistro. It's on the corner of Fruitville Pike and Petersburg Rd. I saw the word "gelato" as we sped by and mentioned it to Maryanne. She told Bob immediately, and he had also been tipped off by someone else who'd tried it. It WAS the real thing.
So now we've visited several times. I haven't had a bad bite yet. The pasta dishes are divine. Today they had a peppery tomato lobster bisque that was one of the best soups I've ever had. The salads are imaginative and fresh, and if I could just develop a taste for goat cheese, there'd be nothing on the menu I wouldn't love.
Today we were eating together because nephew Rob is home for about 48 hours before heading to Boulder for an internship. We won't see him for a while.
Rob and Maryanne had salads while the rest of us had personal (10") handmade artisan pizzas (gluten free available). Molly had the Pollo and Pesto.
I had shrimp, garlic, and olive.
Bob had the Rustica - pepperoni, sausage, onion and pepper.
And then we hit the gelato bar.
I tasted the raspberry and then the lemon, wavering momentarily on the lemon that tastes exactly like a lemon meringue pie, before choosing a small cup of chocolate and espresso mixed. I also tasted Molly's tiramisu gelato (yum!).
They have a nice outdoor patio area that we might try next time. 
Now I *should* be doing homework for the computer course we're taking to keep The Essential Herbal up to snuff, but as you can see, I'm still thinking about that gelato.
