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Nobody visiting the world’s most beautiful city wants to waste their time (nor, their money) experimenting with places to eat – one has better things to do. So we have done it for you. As it happens this was a good time to revisit Venice and observe the changes which have taken place over the last few years. Venice is being transformed from a rip-off city serving up terrible food into a place which has become conscious of its discerning visitors. There are now restaurants which serve up delicious food and compliment it with exciting wines. The city has changed significantly in the last five years. In fact of the 30 or so places we have reviewed as at February 2007, a quarter of them have opened in the last 2 years and several within the last year. As an additional sign of the times at least 3 new substantial wine stores have opened in the city in the last year. There is a renewed interest in wines and their origins, both from Venetians and tourists. But it is worth pointing out that Venice is a poor place to keep wine – there are no cellars – for obvious reasons. It is expensive and far from ideal – especially air conditioned spaces must be maintained which is expensive and doesn’t necessarily provide optimum conditions of humidity – particularly when it is hot.

Many places have been excluded from our guide on the basis that they are really too touristy and are not very exceptional – however, we will keep this under review. Others were left out because we didn’t care for the ambiance or because it simply wasn’t serious enough. And a couple of places have been included simply because they are a legend and deserve some note – Harry’s Bar and Antica Pignolo fall into this category. We have kept our guide deliberately short and discriminating.

I have been visiting Venice for 30 years and travelled there with the anticipation of an 18th century traveller on the Grand Tour, mixed with the expectation of a hungry passenger travelling across America in a Greyhound bus. My recent visits have persuaded me that a visitor to Venice may now expect to sample some exciting variations of the traditional cuisine whilst accompanying these with exciting wines from all over Italy. There are only a few establishments who stock wine coming from outside Italy and these are always at the very top end.

This guide comes from a lot of trial and error. Use it and you shouldn’t be disappointed. There are enough places here to sustain you for a month.

Note that whilst I have selected some very notable wines on the wine lists all the restaurants (almost without exception) have very reasonably priced wines either available by the glass, carafe or bottle (house wine). So there is no need to be daunted by some of the prices quoted. These are simply offered to wine enthusiasts who can see for themselves the level of markup.

Fabian Cobb

info@finewinepress.com