Most Italian restaurants today serve dishes heavily influenced by southern Italy from the early 20th century. Italian foods as we think of them are typically a pasta with a tomato based sauce over them maybe a pizza. but those were heavily influenced by Sicilian immigrants of the time moving into New York and Boston and incorporating what food they could find on hand into something similar to the cuisine of their home country. Southern Italian influenced foods tended to be based on ingredients such as dry pasta, tomato sauce, and olive oil while Northern Italian families brought dishes crafted from ingredients such as rice, fresh (or wet) pasta and butter.
Many of these foods and recipes evolved into new favorites and then later spread nationwide; for example, the muffuletta sandwich from New Orleans which is covered with a marinated olive salad, then layers of capicola, salami, mortadella, emmentaler, and provolone; and the “toasted ravioli” from St. Louis, which is actually deep fried. Recently American’s have been moving away from the generic dishes and embracing more of Italy’s traditional foods. This can be seen by taking a look at any of your favorite Italian restaurants ‘ menus and noticing that one can get risotto, a rice dish popular in Northern Italy along side classics like spaghetti and ravioli. Many other ingredients popular in Italian dishes recently growing in popularity are calamari, eggplant, and various other foods the less adventurous pallet might find off the wall.
Many chain like Bucca di Beppo still lean on the classic image of the “mom and pop” Italian- American restaurant using the popular aesthetic of Chianti bottles candle holders and tables decorated with red checked tablecloths. Others like Olive Garden try to instill a sense of being in Italy through architecture and grape vine accents.