The summer menu, for us, is never a decision made at a desk in March. It is something built slowly in the first weeks of June, when the Rialto market receives the first serious hauls of oily fish and Chioggia's vongole veraci reach the right fullness. Our chef walks the stalls every morning, comes back to the kitchen with what he has seen, and from there the week's menu is born. From June to September 2026 you will find dishes that follow this rhythm, with a few fixed chapters that never change because they are our way of cooking.
The opening belongs to raw seafood. Sea bass carpaccio with Garda oil and Amalfi lemon zest, red prawns from Mazara with a drop of aged balsamic vinegar, Scardovari oysters in their shell with only freshly cracked black pepper. These are dishes that ask only for perfect raw material and light hands: no sauces, no unnecessary decoration. Guests who sit down in summer almost always start here, and we suggest a Lugana Vermentino or a brut Valdobbiadene Prosecco, well chilled.
Among the pasta courses, what never changes is the Venetian spaghetto with vongole veraci — which we make white, without tomato, with only in-shirt garlic, parsley, a drizzle of oil and the natural savour of the shellfish. Alongside, summer brings bigoli in salsa with Cantabrian anchovies, fish risottos changed each week according to the market — the one with gò, a forgotten lagoon fish, always returns in June — and our paranza fry served in a paper cone, crisp and light as it should be.
The mains look out to the open sea. Salt-baked branzino cooked whole and opened at the table, grilled turbot with seasonal little vegetables, sea bream in a lagoon-herb crust. For those who love bold flavours, old-style baccalà mantecato returns to the menu, served on a slice of toasted white polenta. We close with our usual desserts: pear and chocolate tart, grandmother's tiramisù in its ceramic bowl, and — for summer — a lemon and basil sorbet washed down with a last glass of Recioto di Soave.
