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" New York Tony May hopped the ocean liner Italia for New York in 1963. When he got here, he says, &amp;quot;I saw Italian food I did not recognize written in a language I did not understand. It was depressing.&amp;quot; Since then, no one has done more to change the garlic-and-red-sauce image of Italian food than May. His new two-hundred-seat SD26 shows just how Italian cuisine, and May, have evolved.  Where San Domenico, the restaurant he closed in 2008 after twenty years, was steeped in the elegance of Italian aristocracy, SD26 (San Domenico, Twenty-sixth Street, get it?) is, says May, &amp;quot;a restaurant projected into the future, to meet the challenge of a new consumer.&amp;quot; And so he has all but handed over the reins to his daughter, Marisa, who is not only the face of the new venture but its energy and soul. With a clean, geometric design by modernist Massimo Vignelli (he created the iconic New York City subway map), SD26 is as minimalist as San Domenico was effusive. Under imported wunderkind Matteo Bergamini, the menu uses almost exclusively Italian products \u2014 culatello ham from Emilia-Romagna, red shrimp from Sicily. Start with a platter of antipasti: salumi, cheeses, dried tuna bottarga with red onion and orange. San Domenico&amp;#039;s signature pasta \u2014 a fat raviolo stuffed with an oozing egg yolk and glazed with truffle butter \u2014 is here, now joined by candele with n&amp;#039;duja, a spicy pork sausage. For a main, share the massive bistecca fiorentina rib eye, rare as titian red, and a bottle of vino Nobile di Montepulciano. 19 East Twenty-Sixth Street; 212-265-5959; sd26ny.com A Restaurateur We Love:  Marisa May:  Everything that&amp;#039;s right about the phrase &amp;quot;Italian-American.&amp;quot; Italian Food in America, 1963-2010: Case Study: Risotto 1963 The beginning: Restaurateur Tony May arrives in New York from Naples. Risotto is a rarity on American menus, made with long-grain rice because Italian short grain, like arborio, is unavailable. Romeo Salta, on West Fifty-sixth Street, serves risotto alla Milanese \u2014 but made without the traditional saffron \u2014 to expense-account diners. 1972 Americanization: Sicilian Piero Selvaggio opens Valentino in Santa Monica, putting a California spin on risotto with corn, yellow peppers, and white wine. 1988 From the old country: Tony May opens San Domenico in New York, an offshoot of its namesake in Imola, Italy, offering risotto mantecato, made with a meat glaze. 2006 Risotto for the masses: Olive Garden begins serving shrimp-and-asparagus risotto. 2009 The new and the old: After shuttering San Domenico, May opens SD26, serving his classic risotto mantecato and another made with red mullet, nettles, and bee pollen. Overheard at SD26: Woman 1: &amp;quot;I could never have a boss that young.&amp;quot; Woman 2: &amp;quot;Oh, my God. It&amp;#039;s so ridiculous.&amp;quot; Woman 1: &amp;quot;There has to be an attraction.&amp;quot; Woman 2: &amp;quot;There&amp;#039;s none.&amp;quot; "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/food-drink/restaurants/reviews/a8717/sd26-new-york-1110/>