Eating Italian Food in New York?!

So: I posted quite a lot about food already, and I'll keep this pace hopefully. I've never dedicated a whole post - though - to eating Italian Food in New York.

Let me start in an optimistic way: IT'S NOT BAD.

If you're not accustomed with the Italian culture you might not know that Italians are well known to always complain, when abroad, about food. Especially when food is sold as "Italian". To this extent they might be sort of right, since most of Mario's Restaurants or Capri Pizzerias around the US serve all but Italian food.

In a sense they accommodated American tastes to Italian recipes, but that doesn't make a good restaurant.

So, what is different in New York?!




Well, everything and nothing. Let me be clear: most restaurant follows the same ideology of the others around the States. They just need people to think that they're eating Italian (while they're not!). But some restaurants make an amazing job of cooking a delicious Italian meal.

For example a lot of pizzerias in Brooklyn are actually held by Italian dudes who believe in the TRUE PIZZA, and would never waste they're time cooking a surrogate for different tastes. Also in Little Italy many Italians are still running business that fit the Italian way of life, but I wouldn't suggest them - since they seems like traps for tourists (if you know what I mean). Finally, remember about Uptown Manhattan, which is always forgotten or derogatorily referred to as "Harlem" (or "Bronx", guess what?!). There you can find some pretty amazing Italian pizzerias around Columbia University, and some very good restaurants.

Let me just close with few remarks for Italians tourist in New York: don't enter an Italian restaurant hoping to find the kind of cuisine you find in your neighborhood in Rome, or in Naples, or Turin. Don't think of your grandmother's Lasagnas when biting a Lasagna in New York, DON'T PICTURE THE HOUSE WERE YOU WERE RAISED!

That's always gonna let you down. Believe me, is the kind of frustration that in turn causes the general opinion: "In US you can't eat well" (which may hold in the States, but it DOES NOT in New York). It's just a different kind of meal. I hope you didn't cross the Atlantic to find exactly the same dishes, right?!

I hope that this could help. I will be back on the topic with dedicated posts about restaurants I recommend (or not), just give me a few days to try all the restaurants in New York (!).

Cheers,

Guido.