Yesterday, we did nothing. This could be a short blog, but it won’t be. We were supposed to meet Nan for lunch, but it turned out that she had too much on her plate for the day. As it turned out, so did we. We finally left the apartment around 12:30 to go get a late lunch, figuring that, since we had dinner reservations at 9:15, we should eat a substantial lunch. We walked to Calle Lunga San Barnaba to a restaurant that our violin maker friend, Riccardo, had recommended. It is called The African Experience and is one of two restaurants that were designed as places where immigrants could demonstrate their culinary skills. The owners go to the refugee camps and essentially have a cooking contest. The cooks and waiters we talked to were from Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire. Excellent food and quite different from the normal menu in Venice. We had appetizers of vegetable rolls (like spring rolls) and falafel. I had a lamb stew on one of the big flat thin Ethiopian breads and BJ had a vegetable stew with peas and beans and rice. They also brought us, free of charge just to taste, some spice empanadas with meat and yogurt sauce and a dessert of chocolate torte. Everything was delicious and a good change. We were full enough that we thought we could make it till our 9:15 dinner time easily.

After lunch we walked down to the Zattere and then back along the Giudecca Canal to San Trovaso, stopping at the wine shop to pick up a new bottle of white, a souave this time. Back to the apartment to read, nap and practice violin. We killed time until 9 and then, still doubting the wisdom of eating out twice in a day and still full, walked to Ai Artisti for dinner. One of the best, most interesting meals I have ever had. The chef is Japanese. I (Alan, this time) had an appetizer of scallops, dusted with Panko and lightly fried, with romanesco and flavored with something strange and interesting which turned out to be bergamot. BJ had clams and mussels in a saffron tinted broth that was flavorful and intriguing. For our main courses, I had gnocchi with chanterelle mushrooms and rabbit confit and BJ had spaghetti with shrimp. Both dishes were fantastic. For dessert, we split a panna cotta with grappa, raisins, bananas, pomocaco (a local fruit like a hard persimmon), matcha tea, and coffee, incredible flavors. The guy at the table next to us appeared to be a food writer, he knew everyone in the restaurant, embraced and bowed to the chef, seemed to be having a tasting menu of appetizers, and kept leaning forward, putting his nose almost in the food and inhaling deeply.

We staggered home and were unable to go to sleep until after 1AM. Today (Thursday), we will spend the day digesting our food-a-thon meals, right after we eat our breakfast pastries.