Rao’s Cookbook: Over 100 Years of Italian Home Cooking

Rao’s Cookbook: Over 100 Years of Italian Home Cooking by Frank Pellegrino brings the food and history of legendary East Harlem restaurant Rao’s into the home kitchen. Published in 1998, the book features more than 100 Italian-American recipes rooted in the Pellegrino family’s culinary traditions and the dishes that helped make the intimate New York restaurant famous.

The collection focuses on the generous, straightforward cooking associated with classic New York Italian-American cuisine, including Rao’s celebrated Marinara Sauce, Seafood Salad, Lemon Chicken, and Chicken Scarpariello. Pellegrino shares recipes developed from generations of family cooking, emphasizing familiar ingredients, traditional preparations, and the hearty pastas, sauces, meats, seafood, and vegetable dishes associated with Rao’s table.

Beyond the recipes, the book captures the distinctive history and personality of the restaurant, with a history of the famed 10-table East Harlem dining room by Nicholas Pileggi, a preface by Dick Schaap, and stories and testimonials that convey Rao’s unusually close-knit culture. Rao’s Cookbook is especially appealing for Italian-American food enthusiasts, restaurant-cookbook collectors, New York culinary-history readers, and home cooks looking to recreate the old-school red-sauce cooking of one of America’s most storied Italian restaurants.