A high school friend working at a Spokane coffee shop in 1982 guided Jennifer Al-Abboud ’86 to the world of gelato. Now, the Logger and her husband, Fareed, use the dessert to make a living while fostering community connections.
“It’s a happy product,” says Al-Abboud. “People come into our shop happy and leave happier. If they don’t come in happy, they leave happy.”
When threatened with layoffs after teaching in Dubai, the Al-Abbouds cashed in their retirement funds to open a gelateria with flavors inspired by their travels. They trained with Italian gelato masters in Philadelphia and Italy, where they learned to make artisan gelato from scratch using a rarely taught production method.
Circumstances landed them in seven locations over 12 years. During the pandemic, they downsized and relocated Medzo Gelato Bar to Tacoma in 2023, just around the corner from Wright Park. Each batch of their gelato is hand crafted in house, one pan at a time, using real ingredients and local organic dairy. Coming up with new flavors of gelato is part of the fun, says Al-Abboud.
“Our Mediterranean flavors include a white rice that’s very popular,” she says. “We have a baklava, rose, orange blossom, fig. We have one now called the Dubai made with pistachio kunafa bar,” which features milk chocolate, shredded phyllo dough, and pistachio.
Al-Abboud recently published a memoir about the couple’s business journey titled The Scoop on Mom and Pop: A Small Businesswoman’s Gelato Journey. Tasting events with book readings correspond with various chapters. During their journey, the Al-Abbouds felt the sting of the COVID-19 pandemic, so the book is dedicated to family businesses lost during COVID.
“I feel like we’re still processing COVID as a society,” says Al-Abboud. “I don’t feel like we’ve paid proper tribute to the people who lost their livelihoods and legacies, and I wanted to do that.”
