hey on dave letterman he just gave some a gift cert for mama leones...so where is it in nyc

It's been closed for years. Letterman is a big joker. Maybe it was a joke?

Maybe it was an old show.

In defense of Mama’s we use to go there in the 50’s while on buying trips to New York ...... it was the high light of our Trip there ..... Would not eat at all the day we were going to Leone's because the portions were so large and food was great .....seeing people saying it was not all that great never went there when it was still family owned ... wife and I just at our local Italian restaurant for an Anniversary and the subject came up about how Great Mama Leone's was ..... so came home and IGoggled it, only to find that it has been closed since 1994 ..... Nothing today is like it use to be RJS

Thanks for sharing your memories. I only know the legend, not the food. It was nice to read your thoughts.

I have a leones cook book published by her son gene leone in 1967 dedicated to his mother---alot of history in the book and pictures of the original restaurant and customers plus her original menu------any takers?

The cookbook aslo is on amazon


[www.amazon.com]

just thought i`d try ---never checked amazon my mother gave me the book thanks

I recently dredged up a bunch of old menus that my parents had saved (I publish the Joplin Independent online and was writing a restaurant review) and found a take-home one from Mama Leone's. It wasn't dated but it suggested putting a 10-cent stamp on it to mail to a friend. Veal Cutlet Parmigiana, Chicken Parm or Cacciatora with spaghetti were $3.00 each. Perhaps, one might criticize the food comparing it to some hole-in-the-wall in Little Italy or the Village, but the place had an unequalled ambiance, a homeyness that attracted the likes of Will Rogers.

askanewyorker Wrote:
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> The cookbook aslo is on amazon
>
>
> [www.amazon.com]
> -Leone/dp/1568495099

all true about the so-so food at the restaurant but Gene Leones cookbook is the best italian cookbook ever printed - notwithstanding hazan et al.

I have a Mama Leone cloth napkin from 1971.

It is interesting for me to read all the thoughts about Mamma Leone's posted above. I have a close connection to this resturant. My father Alfredo Bruno was the Manager for over thirty years. We went there many times as children and later in life, my brothers and I would take our friends for a free meal, and I even took my future wife there on several occasions. Some of my memories are not of the quality of the food, but the overall experience. I have read some people describe it as a sort of Disney World. I can remember the yearly Carnivale celebration they held for the four weeks prior to the start of lent. For those four weeks they would have all sorts of entertainers roaming around including opera singers, jugglers, magicians and musicians. Everything was decorated as if you were in the middle of a circus. I also remember that during these times I would rarely see my father. He would leave for work at 10 AM and not return home until 2 or 3 am in the morning. He always gave me statistics as to how many people were served, and I was amazed. They would serve 3,000 to 4,000 dinners on any Friday or Saturday night. So even though the food was not great this was a pretty amazing achievment. My fathers told me many stories of the celeberties he met and would bring home autographs of some of my favorite sport figures. He would also tell me stories about some of the staff he had to fire, and how in one case the person chased him home, firing a gun at him as he drove along the West Side highway. In the early 90's the resturant moved from it's original location on 48th street and Broadway to the first floor of the Milford Plaza hotel. Once it moved there the size of the resturant was significantly reduced and a lot of the old charm of the original location disappeared. My father retired in 1993 and a little more than a year later the resturant closed its doors. I like to tell people that once my dad left the resturant was doomed. I guess the most important thing I remember about Mamma Leone's is the amount of time my father dedicated to working there. Since the hours required for running a resturant of this size were extreme, I only got to see my father for about 30 minutes in the morning when he would wake up to see me and my brothers off to school and the one day off he took weekly, which was Thursday. Anyway instead of me making this post a therapy session, I have enjoyed reading all of everyone's memories (good and bad), and please try to remember Mamma Leone's was not a resturant but an experience.