{"id":2232,"date":"2016-04-27T11:12:04","date_gmt":"2016-04-27T15:12:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/?p=2232"},"modified":"2025-01-28T09:18:51","modified_gmt":"2025-01-28T14:18:51","slug":"the-joy-of-cooking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/2016\/04\/the-joy-of-cooking\/","title":{"rendered":"The Joy of Cooking"},"content":{"rendered":"

Successful restaurateur and TV host Vic Rallo, J.D. \u201989 just couldn\u2019t resist the lure of the family business.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In many ways, Vic Rallo, J.D. \u201989 never really had a choice when it came to his livelihood. He was destined for the restaurant business, from a very early age. \u201cDeep in my genetic profile,\u201d Rallo said, \u201cwas food and wine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rallo grew up in eateries. His dad \u2014 Big Vic \u2014 owned a Jersey pizzeria and other restaurants, and little Vic often wandered around covered in pizza flour. The business became a family affair, even if the parents didn\u2019t want it to become a way of life for Rallo and his brother, Robert.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy mom and dad said, \u2018It\u2019s an awful business, you cannot be in this business,\u2019\u2009\u201d Rallo said. \u201cThey made my brother and I both go to law school. We both graduated law school, passed the bar, and we\u2019re both in the restaurant business. Their plan did not work.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today Rallo owns a pair of award-winning Italian restaurants in New Jersey: Birravino in Red Bank and Undici Taverna Rustica in Rumson. His newest restaurant is Surf BBQ, also in Rumson. He\u2019s written books on wine and appeared on The Rachael Ray Show<\/em>. Kitchens are his offices, and when he\u2019s not in a restaurant you might find him traveling throughout Italy, a country he visits six to eight times a year, adventures he often undertakes for his show Eat! Drink! Italy! with Vic Rallo<\/em>, which runs on PBS stations and Create TV.<\/p>\n

All this happened after Rallo left Seton Hall, although the lessons he learned on campus remain relevant. \u201cI loved law school,\u201d Rallo said. \u201cIt\u2019s given me an edge in everything that I do. It\u2019s taught me that there\u2019s always a solution in the end. If you have a good argument and you do your research and you work hard, there\u2019s always a solution.\u201d<\/p>\n

At Seton Hall, where he pulled napkins from his father\u2019s restaurant out of his pocket and took notes in classes, Rallo remembers going to the back \u201cat the luncheonette in the old law school [building].\u201d The man who ran it knew Rallo\u2019s dad, and Vic would \u201cget there early, make my sandwich. I was at law school and I found myself cooking breakfast sandwiches and helping the guy in the back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rallo has never been afraid of taking charge. \u201cVic has a tremendous energy,\u201d said Anthony Verdoni, a renowned wine expert who is Rallo\u2019s friend and mentor as well as co-star and travel partner on Rallo\u2019s television show. \u201cHe\u2019s a forceful individual. I\u2019m an old guy and I\u2019m along for the ride \u2014 I\u2019m just in his hands as far as the TV show goes.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Eat! Drink! Italy!<\/em>, Rallo and Verdoni travel throughout Italy and spotlight the country\u2019s history and people, along with the food, wine and cooking techniques. Rallo discovers stories in any setting \u2014 one segment featured an expert who aged cheese in a bunker left over from Mussolini\u2019s days.<\/p>\n

For one season, the crew stayed in Italy for 23 days, traveled 3,200 kilometers, visited eight regions and shot 48 pieces for television, a \u201ccrazy\u201d schedule Rallo said, but one<\/p>\n

he thrives on. Verdoni tells the story of Rallo driving the crew in a rental van with an untrustworthy door that fell off along a country road in Tuscany. After a quick repair, the trip \u2014 and the show \u2014 continued.<\/p>\n

Rallo\u2019s energy and distinct style \u2014 which includes his ever-present newsboy caps \u2014 are always on display, but when it comes to food Rallo focuses on substance. He talks often about la material prima, the prime ingredient. \u201cPeople want to go to a restaurant where they can eat and trust, and a big part is trust that they\u2019re eating prime ingredients. I can go anywhere in the world and cook with simple ingredients and people are happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

But in Vic Rallo\u2019s world, food and drink are about more than satisfying hunger and thirst. Food is life, physically and emotionally. He discovered that growing up and also in Italy, where the dinner table acts as a sacred altar. \u201cUltimately food is the most wonderful communicator in the world,\u201d Rallo said. \u201cYou put good food on the table, people want to stay around. People open up, everybody\u2019s talking. You learn a lot more about each other. The whole thing evolves, but it\u2019s all based around food on the table.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rallo said he\u2019d like to be remembered as someone who \u201cinvited you over to his home or restaurant and filled your stomach and your soul. That would be a wonderful and beautiful accomplishment.\u201d<\/p>\n

That doesn\u2019t sound like a lawyer talking, but they are words Vic Rallo was destined to live by.<\/p>\n

Shawn Fury is an author in New York City.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Successful restaurateur and TV host Vic Rallo, J.D. \u201989 just couldn\u2019t resist the lure of the family business.<\/p>\n

Continue ReadingThe Joy of Cooking<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":2245,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,258],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-articles-2015-2019","entry"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2232"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2232\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2233,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2232\/revisions\/2233"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2245"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}