The 12 Best Trattorias in the United States

Handmade pasta is the whole point at this Flatiron Italian, and the kitchen makes the case with tortellini, tagliatelle, and gnocco fritto the way the region actually does it. The cooking stays close to Emilia-Romagna, which means rich, precise, and not particularly interested in impressing you with novelty. A Michelin star and a spot on the 50 Top Italy list for the world's best Italian restaurants suggest the restraint is working.

By day it's a sausage shop slinging serious sandwiches; by night, tables get jammed into every corner of the meat case and a monthly five-course dinner runs to monkfish, duck-stuffed peppers, and scallops with corn polenta, all with punk on the speakers. A James Beard semifinalist and a Bon Appétit pick for best new restaurant, it's the kind of place Philadelphia gets very right and nowhere else quite explains.

Named for the Roman street where the chef grew up, this Dorchester trattoria is built around the conviction that Lazio doesn't get nearly enough credit. The team makes its own pasta, bakes sourdough, roasts porchetta, and somehow squeezes brunch bombolini into the rotation. The cacio e pepe is a four-ingredient argument that nobody needs to improve on cacio e pepe. The New York Times put it on their Boston shortlist, which the regulars on Dorchester Ave probably already knew.

The open kitchen in back runs loud and visible, which sets the tone for this Southern Italian restaurant near Gramercy Park. Exposed brick, warm lighting, and tables full of people who dressed up just enough give it a convincing urban trattoria feel. The menu leans into the Italian-American canon with enough care to make it interesting again, and the amari list runs deep enough to suggest someone here has a hobby.

White tile, long booths, and a spacious patio set the tone at this neighborhood osteria from a Jackson native who also runs the bar across the street. The Italian-American menu leans house-made pasta and shareable plates, with pork and ricotta meatballs in tomato gravy as a regular fixture. The kind of place where the menu is long enough that nobody at the table agrees on what to order, which is generally a good sign.

Mano a Mano is a dimly lit Italian trattoria on Milwaukee Avenue, run by the people behind the neighboring Andros Taverna and Asador Bastian, so the block is basically a family reunion with better lighting. The pastas are made in-house, with seafood-stuffed shapes and a cacio e pepe, and the focaccia arrives with stracchino. Expect a wine list with some ambition and a mid-to-upper bill, so dress like you planned this.

Sunday Sauce is an Italian-American restaurant on North Killingsworth that treats New Jersey red-sauce comfort food as a cuisine worth remastering. The decor is a loving nod to Y2K little league pizza parties, which is a sentence nobody expected to write about a pasta joint. It works for a date or a Tuesday, and the lunch menu now runs to heroes and subs, with the Bergen County line debate left to you.

The bucatini arrives spun tableside inside a wheel of parmigiana, which tells you immediately that this Arlington red-sauce Italian spot has more going on than the checkered-tablecloth classics. Chef Mike Cordero keeps inventing, so the menu shifts, but the instinct stays the same: familiar comfort food pushed somewhere unexpected. The room fills with people who came for spaghetti and meatballs and end up ordering whatever the server talks them into.