Daniel guided us through a bewildering array of back-passages with the promise of serious fishy action at Trattoria Antiche Carampane. We eventually found the right street and were pleased to score the only remaining table for the evening.

The restaurant does not have a menu, instead your waiter will talk you though the seafood they have on offer that day. They were more involved than at previous restaurants, so we were pleased they spoke impeccable English.

The starters brought tears of pleasure to our eyes. Daniel had grilled razor calms with scallops. Here in the Adriatic they are much smaller than elsewhere, but the taste and texture is, if anything, more lewdly pleasurable than anywhere else.

I had a huge plateful of sheets of raw seafood. The fish (John Dory, sea bass, gilt-head bream and mackerel) was the nun's nethers, but it paled into mediocrity when I tried the mind-buggeringly good raw scampi. This was real food porn, I was deeply excited.

The rest of our company had lobster salad with tomatoes, feta and onions. The lobster was out of this world; it kicked the arse of the lobster at Le Bernardin.

Daniel's healthy appetite tempted him to have a pasta course. Spaghetti with spicy seafood ragu; we were told this was a house specialty. When it arrived we were alarmed by its strong smell of curry. Happily, the taste was a lot more balanced with strongly flavoured mussels and small brown shrimp.

I had ordered John Dory fillet with mushrooms for my main course. Once again, this was obscenely good. The fish was perhaps a tad over-done, but the rich mushrooms and the fresh, intense flavour of the fish brought tears of joy to my eyes.

The pinnacle of the meal was Daniel's turbot, poached to perfection, it was served with a orange and grapefruit sauce. The tart, yet slightly sweet, buttery sauce coated the fish and sharpened the flavours. I doubt anyone will ever cook or eat a better piece of fish than this.

Desserts (Panna Cotta two ways, with marsala reduction and strawberry coulis; liquid lemon sorbet in a glass and a sharon fruit bavarois) were nice, but nowhere near the screaming brilliance of the preceding courses.

The wine list was near-all Italian, with many mystery growers. We settled on a Slovenian Malvasia from Klinec, 2006, which provided a degree of interest.

Cost per head: €65 with half a bottle of wine per person and mineral water.

Contact details: Trattoria Antiche Carampane, San Polo 1911, Rio Tera de la Carampane. +39 041 5240165. Do book ahead of time, as we were very lucky to score a table.

After fighting our way through Venice guided by a woefully inaccurate map we finally found Osteria al Portego, an un-assuming neighbourhood bar and kitchen that provided satisfying and un-pretentious food.

Being lunchtime the menu was largely themed on pasta, which is fine for most people but it left me with a limited choice of dishes. I had Bresaola with cherry tomatoes, rocket and Padano cheese. I was very pleased that the tomatoes were at room temperature (rather than being plucked straight from the fridge as is generally the case in Blighty). OK, I may not be so thrilled with vast quantities of rocket, but the dish was well-balanced and quite enjoyable.

Daniel was not so limited on the wheat front, and so ordered spaghetti with mantis shrimps. The latter had been cooked whole in a powerful tomato sauce, and their flavour had infused the entire dish. Honest food, cooked with impeccable ingredients.

This meal cost €17 per head including some vaguely passable Pinot Grigio. You cannot really do much better for that money.

Contact details: Osteria al Portego, Castello 6015, Calle de la Malvasia. +39 041 5229038.

Tonight three of us sallied forth from our place of residence in search of some fishy comestibles; Alle Testiere was a top address for obtaining what we were after.

The menu was short and to the point, it demonstrated that quality seafood was what they were all about. The wine list was also brief and to the point, but it included some interesting wines. We chose some Gewurztraminer from Falkenstein which is a heroically characterful wine as far as Italian white wines go. It was reasonably priced and served us well through the meal.

Our first courses were remarkably good. Steamed mantis shrimps were the freaking cat's rude bits, packed with rich, sweet flavour even if the steaming made the texture a bit awkward. The locals would have us believe that at this time of year a single mantis shrimp is a better thing to eat than a whole chicken. We are certainly agreed that seven of them are better than a chicken.

The other starters were soft shell crabs (see left for what they look like when alive), which were delicious, turned in flour and briefly fried; slightly crunchy little morsels of utter loveliness. Finally there was a selection of raw seafood selected from the market that day. The raw langoustines were truly magical, with a great texture and a mouth-coating richness. The oysters and prawns that came with this were damned good, but not as colourfully delightful as the langoustines.

Daniel was the only one of us to have a pasta course. This was baby squid, tentacles and all, cooked with gnocchi in a squid ink and cinnamon sauce. This was perhaps the least compelling dish of the night, with the cinnamon making it just a bit too weird to be truly satisfying.

The food was certainly back on track with the main courses. Two of us shared a mixture of the day's fish and crustaceans. This turned out to be langoutines, prawns, sea bass and baby sole. The prawns were a tad on the well-cooked side, but the fish was completely compelling. Daniel had prawns sauteed in a very lemony butter sauce, with juicy capers. The prawns were barely cooked and the freshest and most succulent imaginable. They were further improved by the salty butter and lemon sauce.

This was an ultimately pleasing meal, the food, wine and service were all top bunny. It is well worth making a booking should you be lucky enough to find yourself in Venice; you'll have a lot of fun.

Contact details: Alle Testiere, Castello 7801, Calle de Mondo Novo (near the Realto fish market). +39 041 522 7220.

In Venice there are one hell of a lot of tourist trap restaurants whose raison d'etre is to rip off visitors with lunatic pricing of inadequate food. We went into Cannaregio, a quiet area in the North of Venice, and enjoyed a lovely meal at Osteria da Rioba which was a comparative bargain.

From the fish-heavy menu we chose prawns in saor to start with. Saor is a Venitian speciality which is a mixture of oil, white wine vinegar and crushed grapes. The prawns were very juicy and sweet and came with shallots in Balsamic vinegar. Yummy.

We followed this with risotto of scallops and porchini mushrooms. This was cooked to perfection, the rice had a great texture, soft with just a little bit of bite to it. The scallops were small but richly flavoured, and were a good match with the mushrooms.

As an alternative Daniel had the pasta dish of the day. Freshly made pappardelle with more of the lovely scallops and a light butter and honey mushroom sauce. The pasta was cooked perfectly and the scallops were of the same high quality as in the risotto.

Our main course was grilled sea bream on a little salad with golden raisins and pine nuts. The such a simple preparation the fish had to be good: it was. Maybe the thinner of the two pieces was a tad over-done, but I feel I am nit-picking to criticise what was a delicious dish.

The wine list was surprisingly comprehensive. For example, they listed five Soave producers neither of us had heard of. I was particularly pleased they had  a range of Jermann wines, including Pinot Grigio. This is an old favourite from my days dining at Pizza Express in Oxford (when they had a decent wine list). This is a good, quite characterful Pinot Grigio, and two bottles of it slipped down a treat.

Dining by the canal on a glorious October day was very civilised and quite fun, made so much better by the top-quality food. Four of us ate very well and it cost a modest €199 including the two bottles of wine. If you can find it, you'll have a great time eating there.

Contact details: Osteria da Rioba, Cannaregio 2553, Fondamenta della Miseriacordia. +39 041 5244379