Venissa — Restaurant in Venice

The service from entry to exit is polished, friendly, multilingual, instructive, precise, and professional. All team members execute their tasks nearly flawlessly. Patrons can spend anywhere from 200 euros to 1000 on a multi course meal, with the bulk of the cost in the higher ranges going to rare and fine vintages, as is the case in any great restaurant. The Venissa complex is a concept in art, architecture, history, ethnobotany, hospitality, and cuisine. As with any Michelin starred restaurant, there are the obligatory "free" courses which include amuse bouche, palate cleansers and post desserts. The bread baked at high temperature of farro integrale which comes scorched from the wood oven to the table with perfect sweet butter is a revelation. It's the best bread I have been served in a restaurant and the timing of the loaf to the reservation has to be fairly perfect. I don't think we were supposed to devour the first one so quickly but a second one came to tide us over. Venissa looks at the lagoon, the land, and the various ways of preserving, storing and cultivating the foodstuffs of the Veneto through the lens of the tiny and usually overlooked island of Mazzorbo. What does this mean? It means that herbs and greens used in the dishes come from the field that stretches out from the modernist haute farmhouse with glass walls. It means that the wine from the vines in the fields is the only existing plot of Dorona di Venezia, a grape that is rooted in the diaspora of Romans who settled the foetid swamps out of which La Serenissima would rise (never mind that Mazzorbo and many of the other islands like Murano and Burano, most of them only recently integrated into the Venentian fold still see themselves as independent and culturally unique). It was thought lost, until one vine was identified on a agricultural island forgotten by time. The process is relentlessly experimental, delving into antiquity and imagination, but the results are engaging and intriguing wine experts as well as rediscovering a lost recipe through trial and error. The bottles are priced well out of range of a diner on a modest budget, and who expects to pair the courses differently, but the vineyard is small and the investment is great. I have drank so-called experiments in other areas of Europe and I am confident that those who can afford to support this venture should, and that the sommelier will pair these flavour profiles with expertise and a bit of verve. The food. There is fish, there is duck, there are game meats, but overall the lagoon and the land are the twin engines of a meal that is once laden in the classical traditions of Italy, but yet magically light and airy with the bubbling up of a youthful playfulness that has long evaded much of Italian cooking. The small filets of sole wrapped like turbans with delicate saucing were the best iteration of a fish that saw its heyday on the Titanic I could have imagined. They were cooked to creamy perfection. Just past a bit raw in the center filet. This fact made even more remarkable by the fact that they are the size of large thimbles. Getting this dish right in texture and temperature is not a simple task. The tortellini with a local weed that tasted vaguely of clean mud and bitter greens and local pine nuts sang. The muddy taste, like the clay of the cleanest creek marries to the impeccable sophistication of the tiny long and local pine nut, balsam cream, and staccato finish. These have not long been away from their tree. Then, the pillowy pasta with sharper cheese and the whole dish held together by a filament of cream sauce. The dish is ostensibly a nod to pesto, yet is is not a pesto. It speaks to caccio e pepe, yet is is nowhere near it. The cream sauce when eaten on the naked pasta suggests where Alfredo sauce should have gone but didn't, and this is surprisingly a very good thing. These are the ways in which the familiar becomes the unexpected. But this is the right way to push cooking forward in a place where tradition is still very much a passion: with elegance...

First, some context. My mother was crunchy. I was thrown out of the house and told to come home muddy. I ate grass and mud. My grandmother would take me on walks through the forest and I learned basic foraging. (I wish I learned more.) I am familiar with eating weeds and if they're the right ones find them to be quite approachable.

Since I was a grass and mud eating child my palette has grown significantly. I'm quite the foodie and do a large portion of my own cooking. When I travel I look to try the local cuisine and go to fancy restaurants in hopes of becoming inspired in my at home cooking. I've gone to at least a dozen Michelin star restaurants at this point in my life and this one was the weirdest I've ever been too.

Food, service, wine pairings I'll start with the wine pairings first. I think that they were ok. Not the best wines, or best wine pairings, that I've had at a fancy restaurant. They had two cocktails mixed in which I quite liked. They might consider a cocktail pairings, particularly as a great way to use some of the other kitchen waste.

Others had said that the portions are small, and I have to agree. For their portions, three sips of wine is appropriate. One to try the wine and two with the dish itself. For many of the starting courses we barely got two sips worth. Honestly with that little it's hard to get a good smell of the wine, let alone enjoy it with the dish. Further in they started to poor a little heavier and it worked out well. (I usually think fancy restaurants poor too heavy when doing 10 courses. This was too far in the other direction.)

Food. Ok so I'm tempted to do a dish by dish commentary but neither you or I have that much time. What I will say, is that some of these dishes were the worst I've gotten at fancy restaurants, and some matched the best I've gotten.

Their dedication to eating invasive species is wonderfully inspiring and made me feel quite good eating some of the dishes. The snail and blue crab were both of particular note as good. However their dedication to having a zero waste kitchen I think is quite hindering them on some of the other dishes which simply need a lit more work before offering to the general public. (The pasta with fish brains in it was cloyingly bad.)

Service. We ended up with all of the courses and wine, but the service was a hot mess. Sometimes the next dish was ready right away. Sometimes the next dish took 30 minutes. (While sitting there with my three sips of wine that I was trying to save.) Sometimes we had our usual service person. Sometimes we had another one. By the end of the meal the chef's were walking the dishes out themselves so that they could get out in a reasonable time. (Earlier in the service the plating chef's did consistently bring out some of the dishes. But there was clearly a change in who and what they were bringing out by the end.)

My partner worked in service for many years and it was clear to her, they were in the weeds. Judging by previous reviews, this is a nearly daily occurrence. They had at least ten people cooking and just as many service people, with two rooms of tables. I've seen whole restaurants run much more effectively, with fewer people.

Right at the end we had to leave to get our vaporetto and so asked for the check. Both when getting the check and then paying for it, we were challenged. "Did you like the meal?" "Yes." "Are you sure?" "...yes?" I've never had that while checking out of any restaurant, let alone a fancy and expensive one.

In short because of my upbringing I enjoyed the dishes. Because my goal is to be inspired, and a few dishes did that, I would consider this a successful dinner. However, I wouldn't go back. The wine pairings weren't good enough, and the service doesn't lead to the relaxing environment one hopes for when traveling.

I wish them the best with their endeavors, their mission is worthwhile and I hope others are inspired. I also hope their team dynamics improve, or they're going to continue to have...

Disappointing experience and service. Our experience left a sour taste in our mouth even though the food was wonderful. The food was interesting and delicious, and the narrative woven about invasive creatures in the lagoon and the need to waste less compelling, but we walked away from our dinner felling less than welcome guests and more like a situation they were unable to handle. lt. We dined at Venissa in August after booking their August Experience for three people. After confirming our seating with the reservations staff twice before arriving, when we presented ourselves at the entrance for our 8 o'clock reservation, I was told quite abruptly and forcefully twice "No Madame you are wrong, your reservations must be at the Osteria!" Only after showing the staff my email confirmation that we indeed had booked the August Experience and had reservations at The Restaurant were we told to wait while our table was set. When we were presented the menu, we again asked what we had booked and had to confirm by showing the email again. They then found our reservation in the book.

The meal service was adequate, the female sommelier exceptional and informative, and as I mentioned above the food itself was interesting and delicious.

Our daughter was leaving before breakfast the following morning and we had asked if it was possible to have a small breakfast bag prepared for her when we had checked into Casa Burano and had reconfirmed before dinner.

Upon completion of dinner, with our final sweets and small bag of juice and apple and bread, we received a check for 350 euros. I again had to pull out my email confirmation, show the maitre d' that we indeed had purchased the August Experience for 3 people and had prepaid for our entire stay and dinner. I asked why we were getting this bill and the gentlemen said the Experiences are usually booked for two and the desk had told them "the usual" about our booking.

I had to show them my dinner confirmation three times over the course of our meal. Not once, not twice, three times!

And so we walked away without any sort of apology or the self awareness on their part that they were at fault. When we checked out the next morning, I mentioned this to the front desk and again really received no acknowledgement or apology that this was a problem. This unwelcoming experience was a communications failure on the part of the resort and a serious lack of agency on the restaurant staff to speak to the front desk at the very moment we showed up with three people instead of the "usual two". Venissa has a Michelin star. It is easy to have great service when nothing unusual happens. But an exceptional organization should have the ability to react graciously and seamlessly when something less ordinary occurs. This was a celebratory splurge dinner to finish our vacation, but it was really only...