Pasticceria Gelateria Italiana

Gelato is written into the name, and the shop delivers on it. Behind the frozen-dessert case sits a full Italian pastry operation on Preston Street, in Ottawa's Little Italy, where the baking is done fresh in-house and the glass case is what most people are really lining up for. The result reads as a dessert-cafe with a clear Italian point of view — sweets, gelato, and espresso in one shop — and it has had decades to settle into that identity. It is the kind of place a neighbourhood keeps in its back pocket: known for one thing on the sign and a dozen more behind the counter.

The pastry case carries the classics with conviction. Cannoli Siciliani and sfogliatella anchor the Italian side, their shells filled to order; cream horns and butter croissants round out the everyday pastries, and the morning brings its own run of cinnamon rolls, apple turnovers, and muffins. The cookie counter is a draw in its own right, with biscotti sold both as large individual pieces and in bags of small ones, alongside butter cookies, meringues, and Florentines. For something more composed there is Paris Brest and a house layer cake. And in season, zeppole arrive as an Italian-specialty marker — a sign of the calendar rather than a year-round listing — the kind of seasonal baking a shop only keeps up if regulars come asking for it.