My first taste of tapas in Barcelona

We stopped by this place, Cerveceria Baviera (La Rambla 127, Barcelona) right in the midst of the Ramblas. Touristy?  Sure, very. Atmospheric as well. Some of their bites were pretty good though. The food was grounded, old school and a tad pricey; but I didn't really have anything else to complain about. They were plenty on the options which was what drew us in initially.

The grilled gambas were very tasty and so were the peppery blood sausages. The deep fried strips of potatoes coiled around shrimps were pretty good too.

Osteria Bancogiro, Campo San Giacometto, Venice

This was our last dinner in Venice before flying the next day to Barcelona and was also unplanned. We were initially at St Peter's Square gawking at the eye widening prices of the Murano glass chandeliers (the diabolic ones were very beautiful!) and decided to let fate handle our dinner as we headed on foot to the Rialto Bridge. Just so that we could tell everyone who asked that we had been there.

Bancogiro (Campo San Giacometto, 122, I-30125 Venice, tel : +39 041 5232061) was one of two that we shortlisted near the Rialto Bridge. The menu looked quite appealing and the proprietors were rather helpful even though they had their hands full in the cicchetti bar. Which was packed and looked very very tempting by the way. Alas, we skipped it and headed upstairs where they were kind enough to seat us before dinner started.

The menu looked more forward thinking in contrast with what they served at the bar which looked more down to earth. Still, the ingredients that they were great and we were really spoilt for choice from all the options.

We decided to start with cuttle fish stuffed with curcuma (a genus of plant where tumeric belongs) spiced ricotta. The flavour of the ricotta stuffings were interesting and contained a hint of what my brain processed to be ginger. Everything else was fine otherwise. What wasn't described on the menu was the mille feuille of sliced eggplant and yoghurt potato mash that served as a bedding for the thinly crisp cuttlefish. The potato mash was awesome!

Antipasto number two was a sea bream tartare and smoked tuna with a raspberry and xérès sauce. The flavours here tasted quite Japanese from the soy and those flower bits that they added on the edges actually provided a "floral tea bouquet". Assuming that one didn't just leave the flowers alone as just decoration. Fish was definitely fresh. Raspberry and xérès sauce was quite tart.

I was not surprised that I didn't get sick of pasta after having them for so many days in a row now. Pasta here was so good. Here's a cocoa fusilli with wild boar ragout, cubed pears and sheep ricotta. The fusilli was pretty tasty with the cocoa curtaining as a background aroma. The pears provided breaks in the umami bed of flavors from the boar ragout, but most of the cheese was lost in translation.

Then, a black tagliatelle with king prawns with sage pesto. While I think I liked this, I also preferred the similar rendition over at Vecio Fritolin where the ink flavour was prominent and the scampi tails were much sweeter.

From the meats, came a pork loin that was described as cooked in low temperature and stuffed with Gorgonzola cheese and nuts. Nuts were probably crushed and mashed into the cheese. I'm not too sure though which type of the blue cheese that they had used. A lot of the saltiness from the Gorgonzola wasn't even present. I felt the meat would have benefited with more salt to taste and a sear for caramelization would have done wonders. 

Tthe scoops of mash they had served with this pork loin were exactly the same yoghurt potato mash that was from their stuffed cuttlefish. Have you ever experienced feeling stuffed and yet wanting to stuff more food into your mouth? It was like that here.

Here's a last dessert for the last dinner in Venice. Of an innocuous looking chestnut muffin in a hot spicy chocolate hazelnut sauce. And the sauce was - wow, packing a respectable heat from the spiciness. Done so in a good way that worked with the rest of the sugars. Since this wasn't anything close to the run of the mill sauce for dessert, I'm entitled to one use of a superlative here. Best dessert spicy sauce ever!

Al Vecio Forner, Dorsodura, Venice

It was only by happenstance (again!) that we came across and had lunch at this osteria (Campo San Vio, Dorsodura 671/A, Venice, tel : +39 041 528 0424). Story went - we were trying to get to a particular water taxi stand to reach a gondola point. That stop happened to be under repairs and we had to go one stop further and then cross a bridge to trek back for a ride which we were getting late for. The gondola ride service was kind enough to postpone our ride to a later timing and we had time for a leisurely lunch. End of story.

The food looked pretty atypical much like we expected when we ordered. I had finally gotten to try the Venetian styled livers which were essentially stewed with onions (heart cloggingly rich and delicious by the way) and grilled polenta. The latter reminded me a little of chai tao kuey. It all tasted fairly homely and basic.

fegato alla veneziana

grilled vegetables

more baccala, three ways

a tiramisu that was much better than the last

The best fritto misto in Venice according to Mark Bittman

If Theseus had to navigate like we had to reach Vecio Fritolin (Calle della Regina 2262 - Sestiere Santa Croce, 30135 | Calle della Regina, Venice, tel : 041 522 28 81) from the hotel via his method through the labyrinth to the minotaur, his ball would have run out of string. Seriously. 

My incompetency with directional mapping in the early dark of Venice's autumn aside, I had discovered this osteria the night before while valiantly trying to navigate my way back to the hotel. The place had for reasons attracted my attention so I walked in and asked for a business card and promptly made reservations the next day after taking a peek at their menu.

candied almonds?

Mark Bittman had once written a number of years ago in NYT that this restaurant (which dates back more than a couple of centuries if what I had read were true) had the best deep fried seafood in Venice. I was pretty sure he hadn't eaten in all of Venice, but the point was not that. It was just that this was an opportunity to put the words of a food channel celebrity to the test and see if we share the same taste. Heh!

To start, we tried their deep fried crab and artichoke which were in season. As tasty as they were, I thought a little salt would have gone ways in making them taste better. No complains about the crispy little crustaceans and vegetable though.

The first of the two pasta we had was an egg spaghetti with baby squids, black cabbage leaves and garlic cream. Venetians are really subtle with the garlic thing. I tasted more of the squid in the sauce. Still, I thought it was pretty good until the next pasta arrived and impressed me off my feet.

Vecio Fritolin's black tagliatelle was an amazing. Redolent with the flavour of squid ink like we've never had in pasta before. Paired with nicely boiled cauliflower and fresh sweet chunks of scampi tail to boot. I'd recommend this in a heartbeat to anyone and I only wished that the portions were double of what they served.

The item to order here as recommended was their platter of deep fried seafood and vegetables. We had noticed that it was on almost every other table. Even on the one just next to ours that freakily ordered exactly the same items as we did. I suppose it was all very decent fried seafood. Again in need of some salt to elevate the flavors. It's also a first time that a large amount of fried stuff I'm eating were babies of the actual seafood.

But anyone that thinks that what they did here is amazing (Mr Bittman!) needs to visit Porta Porta for comparison.

Dessert was a very innocuous but wonderfully robust and creamy saffron creme brulee that I would order again if I ever get the chance to come back.

Trattoria da Romano, Via Galuppi, Burano

Burano is a 40 minute vaporetto ride from the main island of Venice. Like its neighbour Murano, it is famed for craftsmanship. But here, it is lace instead of artisanal glass. And houses painted in cheerful happy colors that dot the residential part of the land. Until the day we had decided to visit it, I hadn't known that it was also a place where Anthony Bourdain visited once in an episode of No Reservations for their risotto of no tiny fame.

In an old school eatery call Trattoria da Romano (Via Galuppi, 221 | Burano, Venice, tel : +39 041 73 0030) where the waitering is still a respectable profession that required one to be genteelly observant, knowledge of what the restaurant is serving and a fish filleting dexterity that has been honed to the point that the job is done before a cooked fish has turned cold after it has been trolley-ed to the customer.

Seriously.

To start off, we had picked sea snails doused in olive oil and a squeeze of lemon.

The follow up was the one of the stars of the lunch. A risotto di Goa that was made from a fish broth reduced into the rice. The flavour of the risotto turned out to be very balanced. A little different from what I had in mind of a rich fish broth. There was just enough of that fish flavour and rich creaminess that hadn't threatened to overwhelm one another in a mask of savory goodness.

Mindblowingly awesome it wasn't. But it was still a good risotto.

Then came the second star of the lunch which was juicy grilled scampi that was a little expensive. Wished those scampi had more meat. It was truly wowingly good. The wowingly good was largely due to the fact that these crustaceans were sweet from the freshness. The grill elevated them to the next level. In fact, we liked it so much that after a while, the fork and knife were forgotten and we were happily sucking the contents out of the head.

Next up was a last minute add on of their cuttlefish ink spaghetti with bits of cuttlefish thrown in for bite. Totally enjoyable this was.

To wrap up with something sweet, a pretty and decent cioccolato torta which we spied on the cake trays by the bar.

This place did represent certain aspects of what we liked a lot about the food here being straight forward and delicious in spite of the fact that we're eating in a very touristy area. It was not an inexpensive lunch by any measure, but it left us leaving with a smile on our faces.

Service was excellent.

Osteria Al Diavolo E L'acquasanta, San Polo, Venice

We stumbled upon this bar/restaurant (San Polo 561b | Calle della Madonna, Venice, tel : +39 041 277 0307) not too far away from the Rialto bridge purely by happenstance while wandering around in the early twilight of autumn within the maze like pavements in Venice. While we hadn't decided immediately that this was the place that we'll be having dinner, we did eventually head back. It was a pretty good thing we did.

The menu here was frills free, looked as Venetian (mostly seafood) as it could get and was crowded with plenty of locals. The proprietress was explaining that the name of the bar/restaurant referred the devil and the holy water and that holy water in Venice, refers to wine.

Having snacked through more than our fair share of cicchetti for the day, we skipped trying to pretend to eat like locals at the bar and dove straight into the menu. First up was their antipasto della casa which was basically a mixed plate of sarde in saor (a Venetian dish of sardines with onions, white wine and vinegar), baccala and octopus. Altogether, a great deal of mixed flavours and textures coming from the fishes and chopped up cephalopod tentacles.

Their clam and mussels soup was loaded with shellfish in a rich white wine broth. Here was when we noticed that they were not as heavy handed as most with garlic.

Steering away from the usual seafood laden items for a little bit, we had their bollito della casa which consisted of boiled tripe, salami and something that was described as beef head. I'm not too sure if those were really parts from the head. This rustic dish was simple and actually pretty darn good.

We haven't had some vegetables in our meals for a while so we thought it was a good to get some mixed boiled vegetables for fibre and whatever benefits vegetables brings to one's diet. Those bean like things that came with the contorni were very good.

Cuttlefish was in season, so we couldn't say no to some grilled ones dressed in simple olive oil, salt and parsley.

We were pretty stuffed from all the food and wine that we had to give a pass on the desserts. As unexciting as I may have described this, I think I liked this place and would certainly consider coming again if I ever visit Venice again before it becomes Atlantis.