The usual setup at most Italian restaurants on Long Island is an Italian-American owner backed up by a kitchen staff that largely comprises Latino cooks. But at Casa di Fratelli in Westbury, there’s a variation taking place that fuels the debate: Do you have to be born into a cuisine or just need the work ethic to learn it?

Located on a busy stretch of Old Country Road (in what used to be Ayhan’s Shish Kebab), Casa di Fratelli is the rare example of a Latino-owned Italian-American restaurant, where three close-knit brothers from El Salvador are proving that the surest path to success in Long Island’s dining scene runs through an Italian kitchen.