The history of Parravani’s

The business was started by Giuseppe Parravani in 1898, who came to England as a teenager from a small village near Naples after his mother died. With just the name Parravani on a piece of paper, he managed to find his elder brother Domenico, who had set up an ice cream business in Ber Street in Norwich.

Giuseppe worked hard making ice cream with his brother, and by 1898 had saved enough money to buy an ice cream cart of his own. He continued making ice cream in Norwich, and travelled out to Bungay and the surrounding villages to sell his product.

Giuseppe met and fell in love with an Italian girl called Caterina, who had also recently arrived in England. They married in 1909, and settled in Bungay. Giuseppe used to leave home in the early hours with his pony and cart to travel to the Lowestoft ice house to collect the ice he needed to freeze his ice cream. Caterina was left to milk the cows, and when Giuseppe returned he made the fresh ice cream in a copper tub in a shed in the back yard. He would then load the ice cream onto his cart and do the rounds, not returning home until dark!

Between 1910 and 1930, Caterina gave birth to eleven children. As each child left school at about 12 years old, they helped in the business. They went out selling ice cream around the villages from beautifully painted ice cream carts – often being shown the rounds by an experienced pony!

In 1931 the family arranged to move to Dulls Farm in Ellingham, but sadly a week before they moved Giuseppe died at the age of 47. Caterina and her family carried on the business from Dulls Farm, until her eldest son Agostino, known as Augie, retired in 1985.

In 1986, for the first time in 88 years, no Parravani’s ice cream was produced. This caused a local outcry from those who had been brought up on it. Giuseppe’s sons, Dominic and Peter, along with Dominic’s son Paul, were persuaded to get the freezers turning again in a converted building at Paul’s home in Chedgrave near Loddon.

The ice cream vans still do the same rounds as the ponies and carts did years ago, stopping at the same places and serving the fifth generation of some of the original customers.

After the launch of our mobile ice cream parlour at our centenary celebrations in July 1998, we received lots of enquiries from restaurants and shops, and decided to expand our operation and venture into wholesale. This side of the business has grown dramatically over the last few years, and we now produce over 40 flavours of ice creams and sorbets. Our product range has now expanded to include two ranges of frozen hand made patisserie, which we now deliver five days a week throughout Norfolk and Suffolk.