The scent hits you before the hostess does — a deep, slow-simmered current of San Marzano tomatoes, rendered pork fat, and char-kissed garlic that rolls through the vestibule of Mannino’s Italian Kitchen & Lounge on Jericho Turnpike like a Sicilian grandmother’s kitchen amplified to cinematic scale. It is the kind of olfactory declaration that cannot be faked, cannot be engineered by a corporate test kitchen, and cannot be replicated by any algorithm yet devised. This is the aroma of nearly three decades of brotherhood, ambition, and an unflinching dedication to Southern Italian tradition transplanted to the suburban heart of Suffolk County. Mannino’s is not merely a restaurant. It is the living, breathing proof that when Sicilian work ethic meets Long Island appetite, the result is an institution — one that has quietly become Commack’s most enduring anchor for the kind of Italian-American dining that turns a Tuesday night into a Sunday feast.
Three Brothers from Bohemia
Every great restaurant has an origin story, and Mannino’s begins not in some culinary institute or Manhattan staging kitchen, but in the hamlet of Bohemia — a small, unassuming community on Long Island’s South Shore whose own roots trace back to nineteenth-century Slavic immigrants and, later, wave after wave of Southern Italian families who remade it in their image (Calandra Italian American Institute, CUNY, 2019). Joe, Frank, and John Mannino were born in Sicily, and their parents emigrated to Long Island in the 1980s, carrying with them the cultural DNA of the Mezzogiorno — a region where food is not sustenance but sacrament, where the table is the true center of civic life.
The brothers were barely out of their teens when they pooled savings earned from years of dishwashing, line cooking, and construction work to open their first restaurant on Commack Road in 1996. Joe was twenty-three, Frank twenty-two, and John twenty-one (Greater Long Island, 2023). They had no investors, no safety net, no formal business plan. What they had was the kind of bone-deep culinary intuition that comes from growing up in a Sicilian household where the Sunday pot was as non-negotiable as Mass, and where the quality of your ragù was a direct measure of your character.
Within months, they had outgrown the original 2,200-square-foot space. The lines were out the door. The regulars multiplied so quickly that Joe could predict who would walk through the door on any given night before they arrived. The Mannino brothers had tapped into something that transcended food: they had created a neighborhood living room, a place where Commack could gather, celebrate, mourn, and simply exist together in the warm amber light of a family-run Italian kitchen.
The Jericho Turnpike Reinvention
For eighteen years, the brothers operated out of that original Commack Road location, building a loyal following that would prove to be the foundation of everything that came after. In 2001, they expanded to Smithtown, taking over a pizza parlor in the Village Commons plaza on East Main Street. Then came the Oakdale location on Montauk Highway, which became perpetually packed from the moment it opened (ET Week Media, 2020). But the brothers never forgot where it started.
In 2012, they purchased the vacated ToFu building on Jericho Turnpike and began what would become the most ambitious build of their careers — a ground-up transformation that would turn an abandoned Chinese restaurant into the flagship Mannino’s. Working with architects and engineers, they designed a multi-level space featuring dining rooms and bars on both floors, an elegant lounge atmosphere, and, in a stroke of inspired foresight, a rooftop deck for outdoor dining in the warmer months. Joe Mannino has called that rooftop “the best thing we ever did” (Greater Long Island, 2023).
The 2014 grand opening was the stuff of local legend. Traffic on Jericho Turnpike required police to direct cars. The demand was so immediate, so overwhelming, that it confirmed what the brothers had always known: Commack was hungry — not just for pasta, but for the kind of elevated, hospitality-driven Italian dining experience that treats every guest like extended family.
The Menu: Southern Italian Soul with Long Island Ambition
Mannino’s menu is rooted in the deep-flavored, slow-cooked traditions of Southern Italy — the kind of cooking where patience is the primary ingredient and the sauce tells you everything you need to know about the kitchen. Their Rigatoni alla Vodka has become one of the most-ordered dishes in Commack, a silken marriage of cream, San Marzano tomato, and just enough heat to remind you that this is not some sanitized chain interpretation (Uber Eats, 2025). The Pappardelle Bolognese delivers the kind of rich, meat-forward depth that only comes from hours of committed simmering. The Orecchiette Baresi — those little ear-shaped pasta shells that are the signature of Puglia — arrives with a sophistication that belies the dish’s peasant origins.
But what sets Mannino’s apart from the crowded Italian landscape of Long Island is range. This is a kitchen where you can order a Margherita pizza — light, toasty, with a char-blistered crust — or pivot to a dry-aged Cowboy Ribeye rubbed in hickory and sliced tableside. The famous stuffed veal chop, a dish that has become synonymous with the Mannino name, is a masterwork of technique: tender, seasoned, and presented with the confidence of a kitchen that knows its strengths. As Michael DiCarlo of DiCarlo Food Service, the brothers’ longtime distributor, has observed, there are not many places where you can get a pizza and a hundred-dollar steak under the same roof — and have both be extraordinary (Greater Long Island, 2023).
The antipasti program deserves its own recognition. Grilled Pulpo — octopus tossed with celery, endive, and roasted peppers in a lemon-kissed olive oil — demonstrates a kitchen comfortable with both rustic and refined. The Clams Oreganata, topped with seasoned breadcrumbs, is the kind of dish that makes you understand why the Italian-American table has always been about abundance without pretension. And the Antipasto Italiano — a spread of roasted peppers, imported provolone, soppressata, fresh mozzarella, prosciutto, and parmigiano-reggiano — is less an appetizer than a declaration of provenance.
The Atmosphere: Where Elegance Meets Neighborhood
Walk into Mannino’s on a Friday night and you will encounter something increasingly rare in American dining: genuine energy. The bar is packed — bartenders moving with the precision of seasoned professionals, cocktails built with care, the wine list deep enough to satisfy the casual Chianti drinker and the committed oenophile alike. Live entertainment fills the lounge on Wednesday through Saturday nights, a DJ takes over on weekends, and the rooftop deck in summer transforms the restaurant into something approaching a Mediterranean terrace transplanted to central Suffolk County.
The design itself reflects the Mannino philosophy — elegant without being cold, sophisticated without being exclusionary. The upstairs dining room offers a quieter, more intimate experience for those celebrating milestones: communions, birthdays, anniversaries, the kinds of gatherings that Italian-American families do better than anyone. The restaurant offers complimentary valet parking — a small but telling detail that speaks to the brothers’ understanding that hospitality begins before the front door.
Mannino’s has earned over 1,500 reviews on OpenTable, 442 on Yelp, and 225 on TripAdvisor, where it is ranked among the top five restaurants in all of Commack. The consistent thread across thousands of reviews is not just the food — it is the feeling. Guests describe warmth, attentiveness, and the unmistakable sense that the Mannino brothers and their staff genuinely care whether you had a good time. That is not something you can train into a restaurant. That is culture.
Beyond the Kitchen: Community Builders
The Mannino brothers have never been content to simply cook. Over the past decade, they have expanded their vision into real estate development, investing in the physical fabric of the communities that have supported their restaurants. In 2023, Frank Mannino, alongside partner Nicholas Matto, completed a striking new commercial building in Commack — a sleek, contemporary structure on Veterans Highway that now houses a Starbucks drive-through and an NYU Langone medical clinic, with additional retail space (Messenger Papers, 2023). The project transformed what had been an overgrown, vacant lot into a vital piece of community infrastructure.
Smithtown Town Supervisor Ed Wehrheim praised the family’s track record of revitalizing neglected properties, and Councilman Tom Lohmann noted their commitment to turning “desolate areas into popular local businesses” (Messenger Papers, 2023). Additional development projects, including the 10 West Main Street property and the anticipated Lawrance and Main project in Smithtown, signal that the Mannino family’s influence on Long Island extends well beyond the dining room.
This dual identity — restaurateur and community developer — is increasingly rare, and it reflects a sensibility that those of us who have spent decades in the hospitality business understand intuitively. A restaurant does not exist in a vacuum. It is shaped by the neighborhood that surrounds it, and in turn, it shapes that neighborhood. The Manninos have always understood this symbiosis. Their restaurants draw people to Commack, Smithtown, and Oakdale. Their development projects ensure those communities continue to thrive and evolve.
The Sunday Gravy Tradition
To understand Mannino’s is to understand the tradition it inherits. The Italian word sugo — sauce — was translated by Sicilian and Neapolitan immigrants as “gravy” when they arrived in the New York metropolitan area in the early twentieth century, a linguistic bridge between the Old World kitchen and the New World table (The Manual, 2022). Sunday gravy — that slow-simmered, meat-laden tomato sauce that perfumes entire neighborhoods on weekend mornings — is not merely a recipe. It is a ritual, a weekly reaffirmation of family, of continuity, of the belief that the most important things in life cannot be rushed.
Italian-Americans represent the largest ethnic group by ancestry in both Nassau and Suffolk counties (Calandra Italian American Institute, CUNY, 2019). The culinary traditions they carried across the Atlantic — the emphasis on fresh ingredients, slow cooking, communal dining, and seasonal sourcing — have become so deeply woven into Long Island’s identity that it is impossible to imagine the Island without them. Mannino’s is a direct inheritor of that tradition, and the brothers’ Sicilian roots ensure that every dish carries the weight of that history.
Joe Mannino himself has described the restaurant’s approach as “old school with a bit of a twist” — honoring the foundational recipes and techniques that have made Italian-American cuisine one of the most beloved food traditions in the world, while remaining alert to contemporary trends and evolving palates (ET Week Media, 2025). It is a philosophy that echoes across every serious kitchen on Long Island, from the diners of the North Shore to the fine dining rooms of the Gold Coast: respect the source material, but never stop refining.
YouTube: PBS — The Italian Americans Documentary Series (Official Trailer)
The Mannino Standard
After nearly thirty years, the Mannino brothers still work the floor. Joe walks the dining room nightly, checking on guests, adjusting the temperature of the room — not the thermostat, but the emotional register, the intangible warmth that separates a meal from an experience. Frank and John remain hands-on operators who, by their own admission, still roll up their sleeves and step into the kitchen when the moment demands it (ET Week Media, 2025).
This is the detail that defines Mannino’s. In an era of absentee ownership, celebrity-chef vanity projects, and restaurant groups that treat individual locations as interchangeable revenue units, the Mannino brothers remain stubbornly, beautifully present. They know their regulars by name. They remember your anniversary. They understand that the difference between a good restaurant and a great one is measured in the thousand small decisions made every night — the timing of the bread, the weight of the wine pour, the way a server reads the table.
As someone who has spent twenty-five years behind the counter at The Heritage Diner in Mount Sinai — another family operation built on the principle that showing up, every day, with intention and care, is the only real secret to longevity — I recognize in the Mannino brothers a kindred commitment. Their restaurants endure not because of marketing or trend-chasing, but because they have never confused expansion with dilution. Each location — Commack, Smithtown, Oakdale — has its own personality, its own regulars, its own rhythm. But the through-line is always the same: Sicilian roots, relentless work ethic, and an absolute refusal to cut corners.
That is not a business strategy. That is a way of life.
Mannino’s Italian Kitchen & Lounge — Commack 📍 2158 Jericho Turnpike, Commack, NY 11725 📞 (631) 462-0909 🌐 manninosrestaurant.com 📸 @manninos_commack 🍽️ Reservations: OpenTable 🚗 Delivery: DoorDash | Uber Eats
Hours: Tuesday–Thursday: 11:00 AM – 10:00 PM Friday–Saturday: 11:00 AM – 11:00 PM (Late night at the lounge) Sunday: 2:00 PM – 9:00 PM Monday: Closed
Also visit: Mannino’s Oakdale — 1575 Montauk Highway, Oakdale, NY 11769 | (631) 218-0909
Complimentary valet parking available. Private events, catering, and business functions — contact the restaurant directly.
Written from The Heritage Diner, 275 Route 25A, Mount Sinai, NY — where we’ve been serving the North Shore for over twenty-five years. For more stories about Long Island’s makers, kitchens, and craftsmen, visit heritagediner.com/blog.
