For a break from sightseeing — and a fun meal — explore the back lanes, and pop into a bar serving cicchetti — that's the uniquely Venetian hors d'oeuvres. This is a great way to try a variety of dishes. With a good regional wine in a rustic setting, you can eat cheaply and make new friends or enjoy old ones. Alessandro is joining us to give our nibbles some meaning.

Rick: So, what is cicchetti?
Alessandro: It is a small bite, you know, that you normally have when you have a glass of wine with a friend.
Rick: And it can make a small meal.
Alessandro: If you keep going for three, four bars, yes.

Because you can't drive a car in Venice it's perfectly suited to bar hopping like this.

Alessandro: This is cicchetto…a little thing that you grab with the hand; has to be finger food.
Rick: Eat with your fingers, with your wine.
Alessandro: With your finger, with your wine, yeah. You help yourself, one for you, one for me, a little for you, a little for me, and they try you see, look yeah.
Rick: That's a good one!
Alessandro: That's good!

Alessandro says it's alright to just point at what you want, but your selection will be limited to what's fresh from the market that day.

Alessandro: When you come here to the bar, you have to order what they find in the market in the morning; has to be fresh.
Rick: So this is representative of what Francisco found in the market good this morning.
Alessandro: Yes, yes, to find in the market in the morning.

Eating cicchetti is a tasty opportunity to try something new and unusual.

Alessandro: This, this one they are cooked in the oven. You grab it, they sell it from the tail —
Rick: By the tail!
Alessandro: By the tail, and you eat it, just you want, they are fantastic…dopo di me!
Rick: Look at that!
Alessandro: These are fantastic.
Rick: Mmm. Oh, that's an explosion of taste!

But don't forget, according to Alessandro, you only eat cicchetti so you can have more of the main course: wine.