Quay’s Peter Gilmore rates the gelato at Rivareno as his favourite in Sydney. So does Nomad chef Jacqui Challinor and Lankan Filling Station’s O Tama Carey. It will be welcome news, then, that the small-batch gelateria has added a fourth store to its stable – this time, on one of Sydney’s buzziest drinking and dining hubs, Macleay Street in Potts Point. It joins the Darlinghurst original, and outlets in Barangaroo and Parramatta – as well as numerous other Rivarenos across Italy, where it was founded in Milan in 2004; owner Kieran Tosolini is responsible for bringing the concept to Australia.

“I’ve been frequenting Potts Point for many years, I know the area well,” Tosolini tells Broadsheet. “There’s so many good restaurants around, it needed a good gelateria. We’ve been looking for a great site for years.”

Like at Rivareno’s other stores, the gelato, granita and sorbets are stored in pozzetti, sealed metal containers that maintain the gelato’s freshness and temperature – important when the products are made without preservatives, artificial colours and flavours or hydrogenated fats. Every one of the 26 gelato flavours is made in-house on the day it’s sold.

Rivareno Potts Point offers 26 flavours, including classics such as pistachio (made using pistachios from Bronte in Sicily), tiramisu and hazelnut. There are also six vegan options, plus sorbets. But a strong focus at the new store is on Sicilian-style granita – fruit, water and sugar churned in a gelato machine to create super-fine ice crystals. When Rivareno first opened in Darlinghurst in 2013, Tosolini wanted to make granita a focus.

“We had granita in pozzetti, but no-one knew what a pozzetti was, they didn’t know what granita was – the whole thing was confusing for people,” he says. “People are used to the pozzetti, many of the other gelato places opening are using them too, so now’s the time to bring granita back.”

The flavours on offer will change with the seasons, but you might find lemon, mandarin, pink grapefruit, peach and even coffee or pistachio granita.

The Potts Point store is Rivareno’s smallest so far, and much of the space is dedicated to the laboratorio, where the gelato is made fresh each day. The gelateria has the same colour palette as Rivareno’s other stores – dark walls, with a white Carrara marble counter and colourful menu boards luring people to the main event: ordering gelato.

“You get a lot of fads in food, and what we always wanted to do from day one was totally avoid fads … and stick to our guns and do high-quality gelato,” says Tosolini. “We don’t do flavours to draw people in … we stick to doing what we were doing in the first place.”

Broadsheet readers can get free gelato from Rivareno Potts Point this Saturday, June 4. Mention this article between 12pm and 3pm for a free scoop. One scoop per customer.

Rivareno Potts Point 101 Macleay Street, Potts Point

Hours: Mon to Thu 12.30pm–11pm Fri 12.30pm–midnight Sat 12pm–midnight Sun 12pm–11pm