Hallie Meyer

Where They Are Now

The early chapter at Umi Kitchen, where Hallie Meyer was co-founder, points to a background shaped by hospitality as much as product. That experience is visible in the way the later work is described: attention to warmth, rhythm, and the small rituals that give a place its pace. Since 2019, Meyer has been founder of Caffè Panna, where coffee and ice cream sit at the center rather than the margins. The operation’s register is soft without being vague, and exacting without losing comfort — a balance that has become the defining feature of her approach.

Signature

Tripla Panna is the signature, and it fits the same frame that runs through Meyer’s work: indulgent, but not heavy-handed; composed, but built for pleasure. In a career anchored in ice cream and coffee, the dish functions as a concise statement of intent. It doesn’t push for drama. It reinforces the idea that refinement can still read as simple enjoyment.

In Their Words “I’ll eat anyone’s ice cream. I feel like eating ice cream should be happy and not overly intellectualized. I’m a little bit overly intellectual about my own product.” The line places the work in two registers at once: generous in its view of the category, exacting in its own making. That split is often where strong hospitality lives — open enough to welcome, disciplined enough to hold a standard. “Eating ice cream should be happy and not overly intellectualized.” Taken on its own, the sentence is blunt in the best sense. It protects the category from self-importance while still leaving room for care. That is the tension Meyer seems to work in: pleasure, but with form.

Honors

No awards have been announced for Meyer.