NYC's Greatest Old-School Italian Restaurants, From Oldest To Newest - New York - The Infatuation

"You can’t eat at Rao’s, East Harlem’s infamous restaurant open since 1896, unless you know someone who knows a guy who owns a table reservation. (Or you’re really lucky or persistent, like us). But you can walk in and sit at their dark wooden bar under the ever-present Christmas lights, and sip a stiff martini stirred by someone who jokes that he “hasn't worked here that long.” (Just 23 years.) If you ever do manage to eat at the oldest surviving Italian restaurant in NYC, order the softball-sized meatballs, in a red sauce that shimmers with olive oil, and then do enough people-watching to last you a whole year." - willa moore, will hartman, sonal shah, neha talreja