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In Search of a Ciribiri pizza at Venice’s Al Profeta Pizzeria
I’m not at all averse to change, yet I do find it comforting to know that some favourite things don’t necessarily shapeshift when you turn your back for a while. When I was an intern in Venice, on a poor intern’s wage, my colleagues and I had a little black book of great places to eat that were cheaper than the cost of dining in. Al Profeta was one of our favourites. I decided to risk Monsieur’s Bad Pizza Wrath by taking him there for a slice of Venetian pie.
Following the main route between the Accademia Gallery and San Barnaba, take the first calle on the left immediately on entering San Barnaba’s square. Keep walking and part-way down on the left hand side you’ll find an old fashioned lantern hanging above the entry to Al Profeta.
As we avoided the main door, heading instead down the back to the vine-covered terrace that bears witness to many fond memories of balmy evenings with now- far-flung friends, Monsieur looked dubious. “Are you sure this place does good pizza?” I wasn’t, at least, not anymore. “It’s been a long time, but they used to do the best.” We took our seats, reading the menu with intent. We’re somewhat fussy about pizza; Monsieur especially so. It must sport the best of thin crusts and be topped with fresh, top quality ingredients, or he simply won’t bother. I noted with chagrin that the three hundred and something pizza varieties that once graced Al Profeta’s menu had been whittled down somewhat, but there was still plenty of choice.
The waiter returned to take our order. It was time to take the plunge.
In our sunny, sheltered corner of a springtime Serenissima, we could only drink beer. Two large glasses of chilled König Ludwig came our way.
Next to appear at our table was a plate of fresh prosciutto crudo, topped with a segmented ball of mozzarella, fresh from its bowl of milky water. Monsieur and I shared this plate in the hope that we’d have plenty of vacant space available for inhabitation by forthcoming pizzas. We wrestled with cutlery, stabbing each other’s wrists and fingers with our forks in the attempt to win more ham. No, seriously, we’re not THAT obsessed with food. Monsieur and I played nicely, which may surprise some, considering that the prosciutto was paper-thin with a big porcine character and the mozzarella so very Italian in taste and crumbly creaminess. You could almost taste the farmyard in the best possible of ways. 
Ah, now. Pizza time. Whatever would I have? In the olden days of interning, I would usually opt for a variety known affectionately as Ciribiri. My friends and I would chant this word with excitement, all the way to al Profeta. CHEEREEBEEREE CHEEREEBEEREE! It was a concoction unique to this Venetian pizzeria – tomato-smothered base topped with wilted spinach – perfectly seasoned, and generous handfuls of fresh ricotta crumbled across the top.
The Ciribiri is sadly a casualty of Father Time and menu re-writing, but with a pinch of hope flickering away in my overly-nostalgic brain, I asked the waiter for it anyway. “Ciribiri?” he repeated with quizzical face, “No, we don’t have the Ciribiri now. Ma, di mi, how is it made and we will make it for you.” I could have kissed him for his kindness. Bless his big Venetian heart.
In actuality, I amended the Ciribiri a bit, asking for tomato base, fresh spinach, mozzarella di bufala (the starter’s mozzarella had been too good and the glutton in me demanded MORE) and onions. Before it was demolished by a certain starving Kiwi lass, it looked like this:
It. Was. Superb. Between mouthfuls, I felt waves of relief. If my pizza could be so perfect with it’s incredibly parchment-like crust and ingredients so fresh they may have been run across on demand from the Tiozzos’ vege barge at San Barnaba, then my reputation as pizza provider was surely safe. Looking across at a particularly quiet Monsieur, I could see that I was right; he was so happy in the eating of his Venetian pizza (a Quattro Stagioni) that his laughing gear was fully employed in the act of contented mastication, no words possible, nor required. 
And, so, to the verdict. Had Al Profeta remained the best pizzeria in Venice, after all these years? For me, undoubtably yes. We’d only be in Venice for a few days on this occasion, so we could hardly run a full comparison of all of Al Profeta’s competition in this fair city but, in my opinion, she’d be hard to beat. As for Monsieur, he’s still talking about it. “It’s the best pizza I’ve had in a long time,” he says. Repeatedly. I can tell you one thing: if we ever go back to Venice together, Monsieur won’t be there for the art or history, the vistas or the churches; he’ll be there for the pizza. Al Profeta pizza. Long may it last.
Address: Sestiere Dorsoduro 2671, 30123 Venice (to get there, follow the directions at the beginning of this post; Venetian addresses are a bit tricky)
Tel: +39 (0)415 237 466
You can find Al Profeta on Facebook – search for Pizzeria Ristorante Al Profeta.
Like this:
Su Nuraghe, Sardinia
Picture the scene: it’s late morning at Sardinia’s Cagliari Elmas airport. Monsieur and I have been awake since dawn but haven’t had time for breakfast. The low-cost airline has high-cost sandwiches which we avoid, mostly because they already look curled and cardboardy, and the coffee looks like something that might spurt out of a long-disused farmhouse tap. Monsieur and I are not the types to eat for the sake of it so we wave the snacks trolley past. Besides, we figure that abstinence now will soon enough be rewarded when we lunch on some fine Italian food.
As the aircraft doors opened to a rush of warm, Sardinian air, Monsieur and I were raring to go. That morning, we’d left the spring morning chill of Luton to fly into the deep blue hanging above this craggy isle. We decided to forget hotels for now; they’re for sleeping. Our feet had different priorities: they were itching to reach sand and saltwater.
First, we picked up the hire car, which wasn’t the convertible Monsieur had booked - the previous renter had decided to abscond with it for an extra day and there weren’t any others available. We might have been miffed, but for two things: 1. only the most unreasonable of folk wouldn’t get the temptation to Just Stay One More Day - Sardinian weather in May is glorious; and 2. the alternative on offer was a brand new Fiat 500. Personally, I preferred it to the convertible; it had iconic value and would protect me from being flattened by wind and bugs as Monsieur zoomed along the autostrade.
We sped away from the airport, past mud flats studded with the pale pink of flamingo, to the southern Sardinian coast. There, the road led us to a small town near the beach – formed of clusters of small, stuccoed buildings radiating out from a modern piazza. Everything testified to sensitive yet sensible town-planning, the shops and eateries all freshly painted in the sort of ice cream pastels that made me long for a gelato to drip down my hand. For that, however, I would have to wait a little longer.
On opening the doors of our little ‘bambino’, the heat rushed at us like a blast from the oven. It was more than just warm – you could easily have fried a couple of eggs in less than a minute on the scorching asphalt street. Feeling the sting of the sun on our winter-bleached skin, we sought out somewhere shady to lunch, settling on a buffet restaurant called Su Nuraghe. The restaurant is named after the strange megalithic buildings (nuraghe) that look like stone beehives, marking the Sardinian landscape and now quite the unofficial symbol of Sardinia itself. We found a table in the shade, then ventured inside to order. The interior was cool and practical -sparkling laminate floor, glass and chrome counters, simple tables and chairs. There were no grubby fingernails here.
We ordered lots of good, sparkling Sardinian water and plates of seafood salad to start.
Mussels and crabsticks made an appearance in this simple dish, but fortunately for this lover of octopodes, there was a surfeit of eight-legged sea creature before me. I do so relish the cool, fresh flesh of an octopus, served in the merest drizzle of olive oil and lemon juice.
Next came plates of one of Italy’s simplest seaside pasta dishes – spaghetti tossed with olive oil and fresh sea urchin. The precious orange roe had a delightfully slippery texture and tasted like Neptune’s version of marshmallow – capturing all at once the taste of sea air on the tongue and combining it with a unique, briney sweetness. This was exactly the sort of food Monsieur and I had anticipated. Our morning’s patience had certainly been rewarded.
Before heading off to the beach, we stopped at a gelateria for a refreshing treat. I was interested to note the existence of soya milk-based gelato on their menu, which is a boon for anyone with lactose intolerance! Tempted though I was to taste-test it, today I stuck to my favourite flavours: cocco, stracciatella e banana. I’ll never be size zero at this rate and, in this world of superficiality, I admit that such a thing doesn’t even approach making it onto my bucket list. Truth be told, I’m probably not the norm in this respect. I’d much rather meet my Maker with a stomachful of flavour and the memory of a good old slap-up lunch than arrive at the Pearly Gates regretting the fact that diet coke and a lettuce leaf (hold the dressing) had been my death row meal. As Fellini once put it: “Life is a combination of magic and pasta,” and if you could add the freshest seafood salad and quality gelato to that combination, you’d have a lunch that I’d be happy to enjoy as my last.
Like this:
Supermarkets, Venice style.
Following our day spent visiting the islands of the lagoon, Monsieur and I returned to the Fondamenta Nuove and followed the signs to Rialto. Turning down a wide, vibrant street leading to the Ferrovia, or train station, we came across a particularly crowded souvenir shop window. Something in it caught Monsieur’s eye and drew him in like a magnet. It was a gaggle of black and gilt plastic gondolas. His interest surprised me.
“My grandfather had one just like that,” Monsieur explained, “It sat on his mantelpiece. Funny. They haven’t changed in fifty years!”
Crossing the street we walked through turnstiles into the brightly-lit Billa supermarket. Inside was a crowded mess of aisles, but ah, the ingredients in those aisles were worth the struggle. We wandered among the shelves of oils and balsamic vinegars, pastas and grissini, past jar upon jar of sundried, sun-blushed and regular tomatoes to the wall of tinned anchovies with retro labels and the bottles of olives in black or green, stuffed with pimento or garlic or lemon or feta. Had a Venetian genie been in a wish-granting mood, right then and there I would have dropped to my knees to beg him to transport the entire Billa and contents to our London neighbourhood. Monsieur and I ogled the fresh deli section with watering mouths. The array of cheeses and meats was begging to come home with us, but we were restricted to what we could realistically carry without it breaking, rotting or leaking en route.
In one refrigerator we found fresh handmade pasta in little twists, just like the type we’d so enjoyed at Algiubagio, so a couple of packs of that christened our wire supermarket basket. Bulbs of smoked provolone cheese joined the pasta, along with long slabs of Italian nougat for my parents and boxes of Cipster!, a moreish potato snack in bright red boxes. Monsieur marvelled at the wine selection while I stood mesmerised by the olive oils – virgin, extra virgin, infused with chilli, garlic, lemon and basil, in different sizes and shapes of bottle and tin, with labels from all over Italy and (quel sacrilege) Spain and Greece.
Following a last circuit of the aisles, we joined the check out queue, something that’s so universally mundane. As in all supermarkets around the world we stood and waited, shifting the heavy basket from arm to arm, listening to incomprehensible conversations ahead of and behind us. Then, as shoppers do all over the world, we stacked our goods for the teller and packed them into sunshiny yellow Billa plastic bags. Our predecessors in the line were now leaving with their loads of as much shopping as their taut tendons could take. We’d be next.
Out of Billa we went and into a delicatessen along the street. There I found cellophane packs of stuffed olives, Ascoli style, filled with a sausage mixture and coated with breadcrumbs. These are a local delicacy, turning up on platters at all the right Venetian events and normally they have to be ordered in advance so this was a real find. As I paid, the man behind the big glass counter full of yet more cuts of meat and rounds of cheese was incredibly brusque, causing me to wonder if he’d stepped out of his gondola on the wrong side that morning. I smiled at the thought of his big, grumpy self splashing into a dirty canal.
Back in the dark outdoors we turned a corner and I stopped in my tracks. “That’s the bar I dreamed of last night,” I told Monsieur. “You know, the one where we drank Campari, which I don’t even like?” Monsieur raised his eyebrows at me as if to say “you’re nuts,”. Perhaps I am, perhaps I’m not. All I know is that we hadn’t passed this bar until now and even when I was an intern so many years ago, I only visited this part of Venice on a very few occasions. I wasn’t a Campari drinker back then and I’d never set foot in this particular bar, so how on earth did it get into my dream?
Trying not to over-analyse the mysterious machinations of my mind, we walked up Canale Cannareggio in search of La Marisa, the restaurant at Tre Archi which had been so enthusiastically recommended to us by the Guggy interns. It was dark and cold next to the wter, with an icy breeze rushing towards us from the lagoon ahead. Flummoxed, with no discernible restaurant to be found, we trotted up the steps into a toasty hotel reception to ask directions.
“La Marisa? Aaaaah,” came the response. “e chiuso.” It’s closed, the receptionist said with a sympathetic nod, slapping his sides in a sort of Latin defeat. He pointed across the canal at the building which housed the hibernating eatery, its windows dark like a pair of napping eyes. So much for that plan.
As we waited at the TRE Archi vaporetto stop for a boat to chug us back to the hotel, we tried in vain not to watch the only other people in the shelter. The pair were not exactly hiding their raging hormones. With their youthful appearance and sporting the latest in leisure brands, I thought they were a teenage Romeo and Juliet until a flash of gold caught my eye. Wedding bands. The babes in arms were married. So far I’d had offers but I’d never actually taken the plunge myself. I could practically be the mother of this pair of kids now cavorting in the snow. It was a sobering moment.
Back at the hotel, Monsieur and I decided to spend our final night in Venice dining at Algiubagio. It was far too cold to venture further afield for a meal at some unknown quantity of a restaurant, an act we may later regret. No. The Algiubagio benchmark had proven hard to beat.
Now regular patrons we were met again with glasses of prosecco. More importantly, what would we eat tonight? I tried the starter of a creamy cheese called Burrata, garnished with juicy grapes from the lagoon. Each mouthful melted like a cool marshmallow against my tongue, contrasting beautifully with the tart bite of grape. This was the food of my paradise, sending me off into a cook’s own dreamworld. If only I could find this cheese in London, I’d devote a shelf of my fridge to it and it alone.
I moved onto a main course of those delicious fresh twirls of pasta with cherry tomatoes, warm mozzarella chunks, fresh parsley and Planeta olive oil. Monsieur’s enjoyment of the same pasta dish as his starter was evident. “There isn’t enough of it,” he complained with a grin. Having now tracked down some Planeta of our own for Epicurienne’s kitchen, all I can say is you should definitely try it. The taste is like olive syrup, bringing to mind images of olive groves in the height of summer as Mediterranean cicadas chirp in the shade of the trees.
Monsieur’s main was a laid-back pizza capricciosa drizzled with a liberal dose of chilli oil, and disappeared down his throat so quickly that he had plenty of time to spear my precious pasta twirls with his greedy fork, stealing them from my plate. The minute we’d finished, our waiter was back at our sides. “You must try the warm ice cream,” he urged, and we relented. After all, it was out last night in Venice. We could afford to be decadent and on this occasion, it was worth it. The ice cream was a smooth, vanilla semi-freddo, peppered with shards of spicy chocolate. It was sensational. Would we ever regret dining at Algiubagio on all three nights of our weekend in Venice? In a word: never.
Later we lay cocooned in our bed watching TV. News reports focussed on the inclement weather currently washing over the entire boot of Italy. Down in Tuscany the Arno was flooding and it had snowed that day in Milan. Thus, with images of snowflakes floating through my head, I drifted off to sleep that night, wondering if Monsieur and I might see snow on Venetian gondolas after all.
Venice: From Rialto to Prosecco and Pasta with Planeta
Monsieur and I were certainly getting our feet wet in more ways than one, as I guided him around Venice. Having visited the Guggenheim Collection, where I’d once spent my days as an intern, we then headed for the Rialto area – famed for its market and covered bridge. In fine weather, this would have been a lovely walk, but the rain was pelting down and the afternoon was already dark so we tried to keep dry by hopping onto a vaporetto. Unfortunately, the crush of smelly and sopping tourists forced us off at San Silvestro, a couple of stops earlier than we’d anticipated. From there we followed the lonely, narrow calli (alleys) reminiscent of Death in Venice, towards the bustling Rialto, the more frequent appearance of mask and souvenir shops once more indicating that we were approaching a tourist zone. In between the tee shirt vendors and the snow shaker shops were windows filled with an enticement of pastries and boxes of Baci; others displayed strange assortments of clothes that older Italian mammas might buy, the large, natural-coloured undergarments making Bridget Jones’s ‘big knickers’ look small. A few pairs of pants and a couple of bras later, Monsieur and I found ourselves in the thick of Venetian tack-dom: Rialto. This is the place to look for a stunning polyester scarf covered in blurry prints of gondolas and yet more masks. Perhaps it’s the I LOVE VENICE tee shirt that you’ve always craved, or the miniature gold plastic model of St Mark’s Basilica with the teeny ‘Made in China’ sticker on its base. Whatever your memento of choice, it’s all right there in Rialto.
Shielding the lens from the rain I stopped to photograph the market stalls which remained bravely open beneath the bridge. Their brightly-coloured fruit and vegetables provided a shot of optimism on such a dull evening. Up the bridge we went, then down the other side and through to Salizzada San Canciano, where we ducked into a bar, wrapping our ice block hands around the warmth of our coffee cups, the strangers at a corner table whilst local men lounged against the bar, mid-passionate discussion with the proprietor.
The grocery shops across the calle lured us out of our toasty haven and into a couple of delightfully well-stocked delis. The shelves were filled with fascinating arrays of grissini (bread sticks) flavoured with herbs or rock salt, pastas of all descriptions including shapes I didn’t recognise, thick pear juice in little bottles, apricot nectar and the omnipresent cans of coke. Side by side stood containers of artichokes and clams and the couple behind the deli counter dished out slices of prosciutto and fresh buffalo mozzarella from a large white bowl of milky liquid. Monsieur and I so love our food that visiting the Venetian version of a corner store is as much a pleasure for us as gazing at a famed work of art. Dazzled by the options before us, we were unable to choose anything more exciting than bottled water for the hotel room before heading back to the windswept Fondamenta Nuove.
It was time to rest our feet numbed from a long day’s walking in the cold and we were grateful to walk into our cosy room, a wall of warmth blasting us as we opened the door. Even so, it took us ages to warm up, shivering yet fully-clothed, beneath blankets. For this reason, we decided to ditch the idea of walking back to the restaurant at Tre Archi, opting instead to dine again at Algiubagio.
For returning to Algiubagio so immediately we received a hero’s welcome at the door and our waiter of the previous evening poured us glasses of complimentary prosecco to show his appreciation of such budding loyalty. Then he put us into the capable hands of his sommelier colleague, who helped Monsieur choose a bottle of red wine. The label on the 2001 merlot told us it was Piovene Porto Godi, by Fra I Broli, a pleasant drop on a winter’s night. Then the deliberation over what to eat began.
We started with handmade pasta twirls tossed simply with cherry tomatoes, fresh parsley and small chunks of buffalo mozzarella. To this the waiter added a drizzle of the sought-after Sicilian olive oil called Planeta; the result was a plateful of springtime which we demolished all too quickly.
As a main, Monsieur tried the house specialty of Angus steak. He could have chosen the chocolate sauce to go with it, an absolute delicacy to many carnivores, but the conservative in him favoured the pepper sauce. He mmm-ed his approval throughout.
I went for the duck with mango salad, small, soft slices of meat in a fruity sauce. Although an intriguing blend of tastes, it wasn’t really me, and I silently wished I’d had another portion of that twirly pasta. Once more, we decided to leave without dessert. Perhaps if we came back we could try something sweet?
Once more we sleep heavily and I dream strange scenes of drinking Campari with Monsieur at a bar behind the train station. I don’t even DRINK Campari. How strangely the subconscious works.
Algiubagio in Venice
I’ve been reviewing a lot for Qype recently – a site where real people review what’s hot and what’s not in their hometown or in places they visit. I’m having a lot of fun remembering some of my best (and worst) meals, and learning a lot more about what’s going on in this hectic city; don’t you find it’s too easy to take living in a place for granted, thus forgetting to make an effort to do/see/visit what a visitor would? I certainly do, but one hometown that I could never take for granted is Venice.
Put simply, Venice blew my mind when I lived there as a student intern in the mid-nineties. It seeped into my veins in the time I was there and left its indelible watery mark, to the point where I am now writing a book about it. Naturally, when I found out that well-travelled Monsieur had never been to Venice, I was in shock; it became a priority to ensure he knew about doges and Bellinis (the artists, not the drink!) and how to cross canals without slipping in greasy dog poop, so off we went for a wintry weekend and it was then that we came across one of my favourite restaurants in the world. Here’s what I wrote for Qype:
When I lived in Venice, it took a while to seek out the truly good eateries that didn’t have point-and-eat menus in multiple languages, or charge the earth for mediocre offerings. Unfortunately for me back then, I didn’t find Algiubagio, even though it’s been run by the same family for 50 odd years. On a more recent visit to Venice, Monsieur and I stayed at a hotel on the Fondamente Nuove, looking out across the lagoon at San Michele, however, when we arrived it was late at night and not many places in the vicinity were still serving food. We were starving so the hotel receptionist pointed us a few doors down the Fondamenta to Algiubagio. This was to be one of the best dining experiences I’ve ever had in Venice make that Italy.
In spite of our lateness, the staff were welcoming and a waiter who’d once worked in London carefully guided us through the menu. We chose a starter selection platter to kick off with, including a most unusual mix of tastes, from carpaccio of reindeer to a spoonful of creamy cheese from the Veneto topped with slices of lagoon-grown grapes. The carbon footprint of most of the food served at Algiubagio is low, because wherever possible, they use local produce. Even the olive oil, pressed by a firm called Planeta, was out of this world – probably hence the name. We fought over the trofie, small handmade twirls of pasta, simply drizzled with oil and tossed with cherry tomatoes, diced mozzarella, just warm without melting, and rocket, and I tried their juicy wild duck breast, which was flavoured in a semi-Asiatic way with aromatic spices. The menu boasts Argentinian Angus beef in a number of tempting guises, including one fillet served with apple and chocolate sauce. If you’re into beef and can forget about food miles for a moment, this is an Algiubagio signature dish.
Vegetarians won’t be left out in the cold, however; there is plenty of choice: a number of fresh salads, various warm vegetable dishes and pastas.
In spite of the richness of the dishes on Algiubagio’s menu, the prices are varied to suit wallets of different sizes. For instance, the wine list, which typically features local wine, starts at 14 Euros per bottle – not bad for pricey Venice.
In addition to formal dining, Algiubagio offers informal daytime snacks of tramezzini sandwiches or pastries and rich coffee from their bar overlooking the lagoon. When Monsieur and I grabbed a quick breakfast here on our way to explore the sights, it was apparent that this place is no secret from the locals; they flock here for their morning repast and the latest local gossip. On summer evenings the terrace is littered with candlelit tables, from which diners enjoy gazing out at the islands of the lagoon and passing water traffic, whilst in winter the dining room is warmly lit, providing a comforting respite from the chill Venetian air.
The building in which Algiubagio is located used to be a boat-house, or barchessa, which you can see from its long, low structure, but has been sensitively refurbished to provide a traditional feel with modern accents. The kitchen is open to the dining room, which I always appreciate because it shows that the chefs have nothing to hide, with the sort of modern extractor hood that is so modern and metallic that you wouldn’t be surprised if it took off skyward. The open kitchen also provides added entertainment for the patrons, if they enjoy watching pans flick and flames flash in the preparation of their food, like I do.
The staff were attentive and helpful and multi-lingual and knew the menu from experience. They’d tasted the food and not once did our questions about some of the unusual combinations send them off in search of an answer; they knew all the answers. Trust me on this: much to Monsieur’s mortification I ask a LOT of questions in restaurants that pique my interest, so the Algiubagio staff thoroughly earned this compliment. On our second and third visits, a waiter remembered us, appearing with flutes of complimentary prosecco as we were seated and chatting with us about our day treading the stones of Venice before launching into a confident recital of the day’s specials. Impressive.
Algiubagio has passed The Monsieur and Epic 3x test; we visited the restaurant three times during our last stay. It has also passed the recommended-to-a-friend test; when a colleague visited Venice I insisted she try Algiubagio and she was so thrilled by her experience that she brought me back a gift.
For all of the above reasons, Algiubagio is a must-try restaurant; it’s almost worth booking a weekend in Venice to eat here and the mere writing of this post makes my itch to return almost unbearable.
Taverna San Trovaso, Venice, Italy
The Taverna San Trovaso has been a mainstay of Venetian dining for a great many years, with a faithful following that includes Yours Truly. When I was an intern in Venice (many years ago), this restaurant served as a home from home for our group of foreign students. Its warming atmosphere exuded from everything – the staff, the rustic decor and, naturally, from the food . Nowadays, whenever giving recommendations to people travelling to Venice, I always include the Taverna on a list of fool-proof dining venues.
The Taverna has borne witness to various personal milestones. We went there for dinner on my first night as a Guggenheim intern. We blew out birthday candles when friends turned a year bolder. We counselled each other there when artistic pretentiousness at the museum reached saturation point. The night before I left, this was only one place I wanted to comiserate with the comrades being left behind and, in the interim, my fellow-interns and I came to know the various cousins who worked there as wait-staff and their aunt and uncles who were in charge. As the family’s English was minimal, it was at the Taverna that we became more confident in spoken Italian; there was no other way of communicating with the staff. This was the unexpected bonus of eating there so often.
The Taverna was also the source of a great deal of education about what does and does not work in a traditional Italian kitchen. It was here that I first tried spaghetti alle vongole which is now my ’must eat’ when visiting Italy. The San Trovaso benchmark is to toss the spaghetti with white wine, oil and parsley, adding steamed fresh clams still in their shells. As Ma Epicurienne says: in many establishments, the clams are often not served in their shells so you don’t have to be Columbo to work out that they’ve come from a jar. If the clam sauce includes tomatoes, the taste of the clams will be so well masked by the tomatoes that you might as well eat a plain spaghetti pomodoro. Avoid, avoid, avoid. It was also here that I made a classic clanger by asking for parmesan for my spaghetti alle vongole one evening. The waiter’s jaw dropped as he shook his head vigorously, explaining that food from the sea should never, but never take parmesan cheese.
Following an early dinner on a Taverna night, sometimes our waiter friends would join us for a beer or two in Campo di Santa Margherita. On other occasions we’d bump into them in their football uniforms, just back from a game on the mainland. Today, it is scary to see that those young, energetic waiters are now grown men with thinning hair, but one of the nicest aspects of them is the fact that even more than a decade later, they still remember me and my fellow interns. Given how popular their restaurant is and how many people they must deal with on a daily, monthly, yearly basis, that really is quite a feat.
If you need to recharge following a morning’s Bellini-gazing, you’ll find the Taverna San Trovaso just behind the Academmia Gallery. The prices are really reasonable (given that this is Venice), and the food has that comforting sense of having been prepared by Mamma in a big family kitchen where copper pans and ropes of garlic hang on the walls. The house wine is extremely pleasant, inexpensive and devoid of that vinegary tang that spoils so many of its rivals house varieties. If you’re on a budget, there really is no need to go for the more expensive options. How much more need I say to convince you?
On my most recent visit to the Taverna, Monsieur was with me, having been dragged across Venice in the rain. Thrilled to be back I decided to try their seppie di neri, the squid ink pasta that is so famed in Italy. It arrived. It was black. I didn’t think twice as I began to eat. My waiter friends came to chat. I was smiling, a lot, with teeth… and then Monsieur reminded me of what I’d been eating:
“Darling, I love you, even when you have black teeth,” he said. I cringed as I looked into a pocket mirror, confirming that my teeth looked a bit too Dickensian for anyone’s liking. Oh well. We’ll just have to put that down as yet another on the list of fond Taverna San Trovaso memories and remind our friends that seppie di neri should go on the list of foods to avoid when on a date. That is, if you think you might like a kiss or two later…
Recommended:
Spaghetti alle vongole, seppie di neri, scalopine al limone.
The pizzas are tasty with that perfect pizza oven crust and cheap!
