At Osteria Brooklyn, Chef Raffaele Solinas holds court in a pressed chef uniform. In the dining area, the pizza oven warms the room and the terracotta plates hanging on the wall seem to twinkle like Sardinian suns. Chef Raffaele, a Sardinian chef trained in the French method, keeps an immaculate space. On the pizza counter, a stand holds a porcelain-colored meringue cake that looks brushed with gold.

That cake, the Veneziana, has been eaten by actor Al Pacino, hundreds of guests, and almost every Italian chef in New York. (Chef Raffaele co-founded the Association of Italian Chefs in New York, a network of culinary artists he continues to lead today.)