A tour of Venetian wine bars
The most authentic way to eat in Venice is not to sit at a restaurant table but to do the giro dei bacari, the tour of the city's traditional wine bars. The bacaro is a small, often crowded osteria with a counter covered with cicchetti, the Venetian equivalent of tapas, which you eat standing, accompanied by an "ombra", a small glass of wine. The name "ombra", shadow, recalls the time when wine sellers in Piazza San Marco moved their stalls to follow the shade of the bell tower.
Cicchetti are small slices of bread or polenta with something on top, or small bites, at a price of one or two euros each. The classics include baccalà mantecato, dried cod whipped with oil into a cream; sarde in saor, fried sardines marinated with onions, vinegar, pine nuts and raisins; polpette, meatballs; folpetti, baby octopus; tramezzini, soft sandwiches; and, in season, castraure artichokes or moeche, soft-shell crabs. To drink there are local wines, prosecco and the classic spritz, born in Venice, with white wine, soda water and Aperol or Select. The best areas for a giro are around Rialto, the Cannaregio fondamenta and the campo of Santa Margherita.
Tip: bacari are busiest at aperitif time, from 6 pm; many close early in the evening and some on Sundays.
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