Rao's 1
Intimate Bar
Rao's 2
Rao's 3
Rao's 4
Rao's 5

Rao's

Opens Wednesday at 7:00 PM

East Harlem, New York

🍝"the meatballs are my grandmother's recipe if my grandmother had been cooking in East Harlem for fifty years"
πŸ’΅Cash only β€” plan accordingly

Rao's is the oldest surviving Italian restaurant in NYC, a tiny East Harlem joint frozen in 1965 where you need an inside connection just to snag a table, but the softball-sized meatballs and stiff martinis make the hustle worthwhile.

historic 1896 institution
exclusive table access
old-school red sauce
tiny ten-table room
$$$$