Italian American Heritage Month: Jennifer Preziosi

Jennifer Preziosi

Incredibly, Jennifer Preziosi, a fourth-generation butcher and sole owner and worker of Albanese Meats & Poultry  maintains a century old family legacy and runs the last butcher shop in New York's famed Little Italy neighborhood.  

NY Eater says that when you "step inside the store, and you’ll find a display case of bone-in rib-eye, whole chickens, and Italian sausages. Dangling from the windows and suspended poles, there are boxes of dried pasta and fake sausages . . . and a wall dotted with postcards, old photographs, and painted portraits." You'll be "overwhelmed by the dizzying number of trinkets, enough to fit in their own museum."

More from Eater: "Born and raised in Brooklyn, Preziosi began visiting Albanese Meats & Poultry at a young age, though she never expected to wind up as the shop’s owner. Still, she and Moe [Moe Albanese her great grandfather, who ran the store] became tight, especially since they lived close to each other, and he would come over to eat dinner, help with homework, and watch New York Rangers games. “We would just have fun together,” she says.

And from there, Preziosi eventually went on to own and run the shop that still stands today.