EATERY Angelina's

By Tara Ryazansky

Photos by Max Ryazansky

The bar at Angelina’s is covered in cards, photos and tchotchkes. Some are from customers, some are political, some feature Angelina’s family. It’s a little bit busy, but then again, so is the owner, Angelina Borrello.

Angelina’s is a one-woman show for the most part. Her son, Jon Paul, makes the occasional appearance, she says, joking that he doesn’t help out enough, but in the same breath, adds, “He’s a great mixologist, a great personality.” He’s been helping her since he was a little boy, “At three years old he would stack up crates and climb up and cut the calamari with big knives,” Angelina says.

Other than that, she’s been doing things in her particular way since 1975.

Some things have changed recently because of COVID. Her cousin, Mary Ceretta, helped Angelina get her menu posted on social media, and this has helped her fi nd a new generation of customers. Angelina now requires all her dine-in customers to place their orders by phone before they arrive. This new method suits her well. She doesn’t have to run back and forth taking orders, and customers are less likely to get antsy waiting for their meals. Plus, she says, the new generation is super appreciative of her food.

Tonight, Angelina brings out a feast. The menu hasn’t changed in years. It’s classic Italian.

She starts with a salad of Tomato, Basil and Onion with Mozzarella. Fresh and delicious, it’s perfectly paired with a crust of Italian bread. It’s like bruchetta in a bowl.

The servings are so large that I wonder aloud if it’s meant to be family style. Nope.

“All of my portions are huge. I don’t know why. I guess I just have a heavy hand,” Angelina says, bringing out an enormous bowl of Zuppa di Mussels

in white wine with parsley and garlic. They’re piled high. “Somebody counted them once and said there was 120,” she reveals.

Next there’s Eggplant Parmesan, thinly sliced and layered with a fantastic red sauce.

There’s Penne with Vodka Sauce, the pasta cooked to al dente perfection and the sauce creamy and fl avorful.

The Chicken Francese is my favorite of the trio. It’s lemony, buttery, and delicious. Everything is so good, and there’s so much of it!

It’s hard to believe that Angelina doesn’t have a culinary school background. Her journey into the restaurant business started 47 years ago on the stoop next door. She was sitting outside when her neighbor, Lucille McInerney, who at that time owned Cafe Savoy, later Mediterraneo, mentioned that there was a restaurant that needed someone to fi ll in as a waitress. “So I put on my uniform and walked up there to 1256 Kennedy Blvd,” Angelina recalls. She arrived at a large restaurant called Fossie’s Delicatessen that she had never noticed before off of 57th Street.

She worked her shift and was talking with the Italian owner afterward. “He said, ‘I no wanna be here no more. I wanna sell.’ So I made him an off er.”

Just like that, Angelina became a restaurant owner. She threw herself into learning the industry with no background. “It was survival. It was a chance, but it was a struggle.”

“I didn’t really know how to cook, but I had eaten at fi ne restaurants in New York City,” she says, and had paid attention to what she liked. She set to work creating and perfecting her menu. “I did one dish at a time. Whatever I did they liked. I guess it was innate.”

She would cook from 4 o’clock until midnight six days a week, often with a line down the block waiting to get a seat. “When they tasted my food, they went nuts,” she says. “They said it was worth the while to wait. It’s the taste, the quality, the portions.”

After ten years of running her restaurant at that location, the lease was up. By that time it was 1985, and Angelina had a 3-year- old son. The building next door to their house was available. She jumped at the chance to work so close to home. Angelina’s has been there ever since. The little kid who helped chop the seafood grew up and built the door marked with an A for Angelina. He also built a tiki bar out back, and I hear he makes a mean frozen margarita.—BLP