Venice: Cannaregio Evening Food Tour with Cicchetti & Dinner

4.61

(134 reviews)

What’s the experience like?

The first thing I noticed was the clink of glasses echoing out from a tiny bacaro on a side street in Cannaregio—so many voices, but somehow not overwhelming. Our guide Marco waved us in like we were old friends. He handed me a spritz (the orange one, Select, not Aperol), and some cicchetti that looked almost too pretty to eat. I tried to pronounce “baccalà mantecato” and Marco grinned—apparently my accent is hopeless. The air smelled faintly of fried seafood and something sweet I couldn’t place.

We wandered through alleys that felt more lived-in than touristy—kids darting past with gelato, older men arguing softly outside a tabacchi. At the next stop, we squeezed into a spot by the bar and tried fish cicchetti with a glass of ombra wine. It was dry but easy to drink (maybe too easy). Marco told us how “ombra” means “shade,” because wine sellers used to follow the shadow of the bell tower at Piazza San Marco to keep their barrels cool. I didn’t expect to care about Venetian history over snacks, but somehow it stuck with me.

The sit-down dinner felt like an exhale after all that wandering. I went for the squid ink pasta—honestly black as midnight—and someone across from me ordered parmigiana just so we could try both. The square outside was still humming with locals finishing their own meals. For dessert, our last stop was this family-run gelateria where you could actually taste pistachio instead of just sugar. There was this brief silence when we all took our first bite—I guess good gelato does that to people.

I still think about that walk back toward Rialto Bridge, everything glowing gold in the lamplight and my hands sticky from melted gelato. If you’re looking for a Venice evening food tour that feels like being let in on something quietly special (and includes pickup near Teatro Italia), this is probably it—even if you can’t say “cicchetti” right on the first try.