Alright, let’s get back to the Italy meal reports. I only have three more to go, I think. Two from Milan and this last one from Venice, which features our lunch on the day of our second visit to the city. As with our other lunches in Venice and Padua, this was a meal centered on cicchetti. On our first visit to Venice we’d stopped at a random place (Bacaro Risorto) and had a pretty good lunch. The next day we ate even better cicchetti at Frascoli in Padua, a restaurant that had been recommended. Our third cicchetti outing was at a very well-known place in Venice, Cantine del Vino gia Schiavi. In keeping with the trajectory of the meals, this was easily the best of three. Here is a quick look at what we ate. Continue reading →

Back to northern Italy, for the first of two reports from Venice. We did not actually stay in Venice. There were not very many apartments available in our price range, and I didn’t have the best feeling about the listings I saw. Accordingly, we stayed in Padua and took two day trips to Venice. It’s just 30 minutes by train and very easy to do—it was a short walk from our flat to catch a bus for a short ride to the station. Padua itself is very much worth a visit—the Giotto frescoes at Scrovegni Chapel are jaw-dropping and well worth the hassle for the limited time you’re allowed to spend there, but there’s more to do in the city. And, of course, we ate a couple of very good dinners in Padua (I’ve reported on the first so far). Our first full day in the region, however, was spent in Venice. We did some of the tourist greatest hits and after a visit to St. Mark’s Basilica we stopped randomly at a bacaro in the vicinity for a light ciccheti-based lunch. Why so uncharacteristically restrained? Well, we’d eaten a big breakfast at a cafe after arrival in Venice in the morning, and we had a booking in Padua for early’ish dinner—and also, it must be said, there was a lot of gelato to eat as well during the course of the day. Our lunch at Bacaro Risorto may thus have been light, but it was very good. Continue reading →