Brady with her two lucky dogs.

My Story

An alum reflects

From Moravian to Gelato Master

By Noel Brady ’90

Dreams do come true. And this is my story of how mine did. The question I get asked most is how a history and art history major from Moravian ever came to open an artisanal gelato shop in sunny Southern California.

The story really began right after I graduated in 1990 (my name was Noel Knecht then). I had so many ideas of who I wanted to be and what I wanted to do. I found that I enjoyed the intertwining of business and art. I wanted to be creative, so I embarked on my career of designing store environments, including developing marketing and visual merchandising campaigns for retailers such as Limited, Gap Inc., and Williams Sonoma. I poured my heart into my career, worked hard, and traveled a lot. It was rewarding and eventually landed me a lucrative executive position at Walmart as part of the company’s first visual merchandising/store environment team. I was responsible for elevating $26 billion apparel environments while introducing new brand partnerships.

Noel Brady ’90 serves up artisanal gelato at her shop, Lucky Dog Gelato, in San Clemente, California.

Top Recommendation in Eastern Pennsylvania
If you can’t make it out West to Lucky Dog, try Gemelli Artisanal Gelato in Westchester, Pennsylvania, for a truly artisanal gelato experience.

Living in Hoboken, working in the New York offices, and traveling back and forth to Bentonville, Arkansas, was a bit tiring. Yes, the money was great, I had a title, but something was missing. I started to do a lot of internal reflection. I wanted to uphold a promise I made to myself when I beat an aggressive form of breast cancer in 2002. I would do something that would enrich not only my life but those of others.

Every week, my friends and I would head over to our favorite pizza place, Numero 28, in Greenwich Village. As we sat outside to enjoy the summer nights, from our table we could clearly see, just kitty-corner on Bleecker Street, Grom gelateria. What stood out to me was not the line out the door but rather that everyone was smiling and waiting contently for their turn.

During my travels, I started to take notice at more and more ice cream and gelato shops—people were happy, people talked, people were satisfied. Working in the corporate world has its benefits, but the environment of happy people tugs at you like a puppy tugs at your soul. It’s a place of belonging.

I met my husband, Dustin Brady, in 2011 and subsequently moved to San Clemente, California, where he grew up. I landed a position with Oakley. Dustin likes to point out that during our relationship, I kept saying, “I want to open a gelateria.” Well, as fate would have it, consolidation at Oakley occurred, with many jobs moving to the Midwest. I again voiced my desire to open a gelateria, but this time Dustin blurted out, “Stop talking about it and put together a plan!” Two days later, I had one, and it began with six weeks of education and training.

Gelato vs. Ice Cream

The following differences result in gelato’s richer flavor and smoother texture, when compared with ice cream.
 

• Fat content. Gelato has less butterfat than ice cream (4 to 9 percent versus 10 to 18 percent).
• Air. Gelato has at least 35 percent less air than ice cream.
• Serving temperature. Gelato is served at 10° to 15°F warmer than ice cream.
   

The training took place at Carpigiani Gelato University in Bologna, Italy, where I learned the art and science of making gelato, creating my own recipes, and running a successful gelateria. Upon my return home, despite not owning my own shop and being new to the industry, I was invited to take part in a competition series called Gelato Festival America. At my first competition in Santa Barbara, I won the Technical Jury award. The technical jury is made up of local media and gelato and food professionals whose criteria for judging include recipe originality, flavor, and texture. It validated my dream of wanting to open an artisanal gelato shop while staying true to the Italian method.

I went back to Italy the following two years and studied at Gelato Naturale Academy in Grosetto with a strict focus on recipe development and fully artisanal gelato. I also travelled to Florence to study directly under Vetulio (“Tulio”) Bondi, the head of the Florentine Gelato Guild and owner of the gelateria I Gelati del Bondi.

Upon my return to the United States, I took part in two more competitions, winning again the Technical Jury award in Santa Barbara and a third place overall in Jersey City. As a result, I was listed among the world’s top gelato masters (#44). In late 2018, with confidence and know-how in hand, I stepped away from the contests to focus solely on opening our shop.

Finding a location took a while as I conducted research on such things as the population and average income within a mile radius of an available location as well as the number of dog owners, because people who own dogs walk farther than those who don’t. I would spend weekends counting traffic.

The hardest thing about starting the business was naming it. Dustin and I came up with hundreds of names that just didn’t feel right for what we wanted to create. One night we revisited the origin of why we were doing this and really dissected it. It goes back to Greenwich Village, sitting at Numero 28, staring at Grom and the line of eager and happy people. What we wanted for our shop was to create a fun and happy place where we make gelato the honest, artisanal way.

While discussing names, our two senior dogs were at our feet imploring us to pick them up so they could join us on the couch. At that moment, we knew our name needed to be a dedication to them and to all dogs. To us, dogs are the embodiment of happiness, but most of all dogs are honest at their core.

In August 2022, I will celebrate the shop’s one-year anniversary. I’ve built something special in San Clemente, California, and I love that I get to serve smiles and fun to our local community and visitors at my passion project, Lucky Dog Gelato.