Caffè Girani

Giuseppe Girani opened this roastery in San Stae in 1928 after learning to roast in Trieste alongside the founder of Illy, and moved it to its current spot on Campo Bandiera e Moro in 2011. His daughter Gigliola kept it running as Venice's only female roaster after his early death, and today his granddaughters Roberta and Laura hand roast the same seven blends, Casanova, Fassina, Rosina, Arzenton, Todaro, Moka, and Deca, on a 1945 machine nicknamed La Rossa that was restored the year the shop moved.

Green beans are hand picked from certified, pesticide free farms bought mainly through Trieste, deliberately skipping Vietnamese robusta over environmental concerns, then rested in silos for at least a week before a medium roast tuned to Venice's own humidity. Visitors can watch the roasting drum turn and taste an espresso next door before buying beans by the bag, so a stop here tends to become a short lesson in the trade as much as a coffee break.