Italian food is the most popular ethnic cuisine in the U.S., with 61 percent of Americans reporting they eat it regularly (the numbers are 50 percent for Mexican food and 36 percent for Chinese food).

Assembling a list of 99 essential Italian-American foods may be a fool's errand, but we did it anyway, and after much delicious debate. ("How can you leave off rigatoni!!?'') You could easily make a list of 99 essential bakery items alone; we had tough choices to make in our Ultimate Guide to Italian Bakeries.