Italian-Jewish Marinated Fried Fish

Above the night music, the Venetian skies boom and burst into explosive colors, sending showers of rainbow meteors skittering across the heavens, their shimmering reflections dancing in the inky canals.

It is the Festa del Redentore (Feast of the Redeemer), celebrated every July 19th since 1576 to commemorate the end of a plague that had devastated the city. Among the traditional ritual of foods eaten before the blaze of spectacular fireworks is an ancient Venetian-Jewish dis