Rao's

In 1896 Charles Rao bought a small saloon from the George Ehret Brewery at 114th Street and Pleasant Avenue and put his name on it. His sons kept it going, Louis behind the bar and Vincent at the stove, which is how Vincent's lemon chicken became famous. By 1974, business was brisk enough that Vincent's wife, Anna Pellegrino Rao, brought her family recipes, and her pots and pans, over from their home next door. Then Mimi Sheraton gave it three stars in The New York Times, and Rao's answered by inventing table rights: regulars hold their tables, by the week or the month, across generations.

The result, in the restaurant's own words, is a place 'believed to be not only the hardest reservation in New York, but perhaps the world'. The New Yorker titled its visit 'You Can't Get In'. It is still family-run, now by Frank Pellegrino Jr. and Ron Straci, nearly 130 years on.

It is still family-run, now by Frank Pellegrino Jr.

The room is small, with a jukebox and Christmas decorations that are part of the furniture, hosts who are part of the show, and the odd impromptu performance. The food is Southern Italian home cooking: the lemon chicken, the meatballs, the steaks and chops that first made the saloon a restaurant.

There is no public way to book. If someone with a table invites you, go, and say yes to whatever night it is. That invitation is the impressive part.

Text to ask.