“We’re not garlic girls,” says Nicole Vitagliano, with her twin sister, Jennifer. “We’re bad Italians”—doubtful as proprietors of a restaurant of that very cuisine. At Raf’s, the stylish duo’s haute neighborhood restaurant on Elizabeth Street, executive chef Mary Attea’s chicken liver agnolotti and steak tartare with aged Parmigiano Reggiano have become go-tos for New York’s tastemakers and fashion insiders. And that’s just one location in the Vitagliano empire. There’s the restaurant that started it all, the Michelin-starred Musket Room, in nearby NoLIta, which they took over six years ago and are now in the midst of reinventing, and Cafe Zaffri, aka Zaf’s, where Attea’s Lebanese heritage flourishes among succulent skewered meats, spaghetti with crab, and a discriminating clientele on the ground floor of the Twenty Two, a hotel and private club on Union Square. 

When the sisters venture out, the New York natives often keep it in NoHo. “There’s a frittata at Gjelina that’s otherworldly,” says Jennifer. “It’s very laid-back. We run into a lot of  friends.” They see more familiar faces nearby at Albanese Meats & Poultry. “It feels very old- school, just hanging out in the butcher shop,” says Nicole. They’ll browse the culinary tomes at Bonnie Slotnick Cookbooks, just around the corner (“I go there sometimes for inspiration,” says Jennifer) and explore the bastions of bric-a-brac that are John Derian’s shops (“There’s sneaky hourly parking on that block,” she notes). On any given night, if you stop by the adorably divey, dog-friendly Tom and Jerry’s, “you’ll find most of our team there after work,” says Jennifer.