Delicious, creamy, dense old fashioned gelato mixed by hand.  The ingredients are first-rate and the favors intense and addictive.  We’re partial to the chocolate but everything is wonderful.  It’s very near the Scuola St Rocco and the perfect post-museum pick-me-up. Cioccolata calda – hot chocolate made with milk or dark chocolate, or with hazelnuts – is a special treat in winter.

A cozy informal neighborhood trattoria with an open kitchen in the back which offers excellent seafood dishes and pasta and good inexpensive wines.  And if ice cream is your favorite dessert, as an added bonus, the restaurant a three minute walk from Grom, the super delicious gelato shop.  If you order the whole grilled fish, the waiter will fillet it at the table. Cash only.  Favorites:  spaghetti with clams; sepia with scallops; whole grilled bronzino.

Francois Pinault, French entrepreneur and passionate collector of  contemporary art, working with Pritzker-Prize winning architet Tadao Ando,  has transformed the Dogana da Mar, the historic  customs building located at the tip of Dosoduro on the Grand Canal across from Piazza San Marco, into an extraordinary space for contemporary art.  Pinault took over the Palazzo Grassi in 2005 and later won the right to restore the Dogana.  This beautiful new space along with the incredible art, and the views from the site all combine to make this a thrilling experience.  It’s easy enough to reach; from St. Mark’s Square, take the No 1 vaporetto to Salute.

Until the end of 2010, Punta Della Dogana and the Palazzo Grazzi  will jointly present Mapping the Studio: Artists from the Francois Pinault Collection.  The exhibition includes such well-known artists as Jeff Koons, Sigmar Polke, Cindy Sherman, Richard Prince, Cy Twombly, Rudolf Stingel, and Robert Gober and emerging artists including Matthew Day Jackson and Rob Pruitt.  The new space also has specially commissioned works by Mark Handforth and Charles Ray.

This restaurant with its Venetian cuisine is very handy to know for lunch if you’re going to the Guggenheim or Punta Della Dogana.