Dirty Dishes - book

Dirty Dishes, Pino Luongo and Andrew Friedman, (Bloomsbury, 2009).

If I had asked you what kind of name was Pino Luongo, what would you have guessed? Maybe African? Maybe some kind of Pacific Islander? Might you, like me, have never guessed Italian? It turns out that Pino is a common Italian nickname for kids named Giuseppino. Luongo is an Italian surname apparently dating back perhaps to the 10th or 11th centuries, although I confess I had never heard it before. In any case, it is an interesting name for a most interesting character.

Pino Luongo arrived in the United States as a young man in 1980 with very little money and even less English. He was escaping the draft in Italy, where he had been a reasonably successful actor. His one asset at the time was that he was living with an American woman who for a time acted as interpreter and helped him to find an apartment and etc. He was horrified when encountering his first American supermarket where most food was wrapped and packaged and without flavor or appeal. As an Italian, born in Tuscany, and with a mother who was an excellent cook, he was passionate about food and cooking, which he had learned from her. He had also worked for a time in his uncle’s restaurant where he learned the basics of the business.

Luongo looked for a time in vain for employment until finally one day, in desperation, he walked into an Italian restaurant in New York City and was hired as a dishwasher and busboy. Within three years he had started his own restaurant, featuring authentic Italian food, which became a resounding success. This was followed by his opening a succession of fine upscale Italian restaurants that drew a very wealthy clientele. He introduced New York to Italian food that began to rival the best of the then popular French restaurants, in effect popularizing authentic Italian cooking in the United States. His restaurants, from the first one, Il Cantinori, to others including Sapore di Mare, Le Madri, and Coco Pazzo became legendary, as he became well known as one of the top restaurateurs in the city, was featured in the finest cooking magazines, survived the top restaurant critics, and became well-known and famous enough to make friends and acquaintances among the elite of the film industry, politics, and high society. He also wrote successful cookbooks. Not bad for a poor, draft-dodging, non-English speaking, but handsome and clever young man. His is a success story of which anyone should be proud.

And yet, it was precisely his great success that eventually led to his downfall. He foolishly took on too many restaurants to manage successfully, and also suffered from the attacks of 9/11 when the restaurant business seriously declined for a time. Forced to declare bankruptcy he survived and now lives happily owning and operate only one fine restaurant, Centolire, coaching one of his children’s soccer team, and enjoying life and his family.

Luongo was and is a man of unusual talents, far beyond merely being an excellent chef. He designed his restaurants down to the finest details, supervised their construction, and put together successful staffs in all of them. When he discovered how much it cost to launder his napkins and tablecloths he started his own laundry for that purpose. He managed to keep his costs for food far below that of the average restaurant, imported cooks and materials from Italy, and built a food empire that lasted for almost two decades. Like all very successful people he made enemies along the way as well as friends, was rumored by some to be a tyrant, accused of stealing chefs and waiters from other restaurants, and so on. It is, however, much to his credit that unlike some other famous chefs I will not mention, he did not turn out to be an insufferable egomaniac seeking constant publicity by terrorizing his staff and customers.

If you have any interest in the restaurant business, fine Italian cuisine, success stories, and interesting personalities, you should find this finely crafted book of interest.