Do Spade's blackboard

Tips, recipes and stories

In a small slate blackboard on the counter, where we serve our cicchetti, we usually suggest great wine pairing. Here we can also give advices and recipes and tell you many anecdotes, to let you know the history of each dish or glass.

What’s a Bacaro?
16 July 2020

According to one of the many legends about it, the term bàcaro comes from a gondolier’s exclamation: one day, when tasting a new wine from Southern Italy, he cried out “Bon, bon! Questo xe proprio un ‘vin de bàcaro” (“Very, very good! This is a bàcaro’s wine, indeed”). The Venetian phrase far bàcara means going […]

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Spritz with Centino
27 February 2017

The happy hour is a very classic italian ritual, during which we love to spend some time with friends and chat. It’s always a good time for a nice aperitif to break the morning (or afternoon) hunger with some appetizers, while drinking some slightly alcoholic drink. For many, aperitif is a synonym for spritz, the […]

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Prosecco sur lie method
01 December 2016

It literally means “on the dirt”, but don’t let this mislead you: sur-lie method is one of the best methods to produce high quality prosecco and to avoid micro-filtration. Some time ago, when modern winery machinery still had to be invented, several techniques were used for wine production. A less known, yet rather peculiar method, […]

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Prosecco Surlì Col Tamarìe
28 November 2016

During the last few years, wine lovers are discovering the pleasure of drinking winery products of biological origin, not only for their genuine taste, but mostly since this type of agriculture is based upon the predominant use of organic matter that has a limited environmental impact. As an example, innovative techniques were developed to produce […]

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The Redentore dish
21 October 2016

An incredibly simple seafood dish, consumed in large quantities throughout the year. An emblem of Venice and its traditional cuisine, so rooted in the culture and life of the Venetians that it could represent the whole region. A dish that you can find in any Venetian boat during the Redentore (Reedemer), able to gather entire […]

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The Bacaro and the “ombra di vino”
17 June 2016

The Venetian word bàcaro derives its name from Bacchus or from bacche (Italian word for “grapes“). The Venetian expression “far bàcara” means celebrating in the name of Bacchus. It’s just like this, on the euphoric trail of the good wine (“bon vin”), that the typical Venetian osterie were born. In the past, the term designated […]

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The unwanted ones and the taverns
23 November 2015

Today the bacari are cool meeting place that you can attend to drink wine and eat delicious cicchetti. But, from the mid-Fourteenth century until the end of the Eighteenth century, they had a pretty different function. Let us tell you a few curiosities about these ancient Venetian taverns, used as receptive structures in the past. […]

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The perfect cicchetto
25 August 2015

It’s always difficult to choose. You are standing in front of the counter and you don’t have the slightest idea what to order: everything seems delicious and appealing. We are giving you a little help: we will explain you which are our most beloved cicchetti and their wine pairing. Because your goal today is to […]

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History of the baccalà (stockfish)
02 August 2013

The history of stockfish begins in 1432, with the sea journey of Pietro Querini, Venetian patrician and member of the Serenissima Great Council. He was headed to the Flanders from Candia. Due to the terrible storms, he had to land on the desert island of Sandøy, in the Loften Norwegian archipelago.  There, Querini and his […]

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