Gelato Messina returns to Sydney Festival 2016 with a new doughnut bar

Step right up and be wowed by Gelato Messina's freak-fest of flavours coming to Sydney Festival 2016 this week. Complete with a new doughnut bar, Messina is returning to Hyde Park Festival Village from January 7 to 26 with Il Carnivale Di Gelato, a pop-up inspired by carnie food and candy.

One headlining trick is Messina's combination of your favourite dessert items (gelato and doughnuts) at the Duncan's Doughnuts Bar. The Five Million Dough-lars flavour is thankfully not priced like its name (it's a much more affordable $10) - and is a doughnut version of Messina's signature Doctor Evil's Magic Mushroom Cake. It features chocolate gelato, with peanut cookies, caramel, sprinkles of popping candy "grass" and a thick coat of red chocolate glaze plastered with white choc dots to resemble a cartoon toadstool.

Ever heard of bacon sprinkles on a doughnut ice-cream sandwich? Well, Messina just made that happen with The Biggest Gainer doughnut ($10) – with peanut butter gelato, fresh banana, milk chocolate glaze and crushed roasted peanuts. "We've done lots of bacon-inspired flavours before and it's this thing where they sound a bit gross, but they actually taste really delicious. So it works really well," says Gelato Messina spokesperson Sian Bishop.

Messina's festival favourites the Yeeeah Dawg gelato "hot dog" and Messina Weiner "corn dog", which notched up around 7000 sales, are making a comeback, too.

The Bearded Lady ($10) will make her debut. She's a cream-cheese gelato popsicle with thin red chocolate coating, red velvet cake crunch, red fairy floss and red velvet cake powder.

And if the soggy weather is deterring you from making a visit, don't worry: "this time we have a big space inside where it's all undercover with lots of seating," says Bishop.

During Sydney Festival's Family Week (January 12 to 16), Messina will serve a mini menu for kids from 10am to 3pm. And they'll be able to snap a novelty pic to match their dessert. "You know those things that you put your head in at the circus or the seaside, where it makes you look like you're a weird old man or a bearded lady? We're doing one of those as well," says Bishop.

Open Tue-Sun noon-late from January 7-26.

Hyde Park Festival Village, near Archibald Fountain in Hyde Park, Sydney, sydneyfestival.org.au