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For the past century, Italian-Americans have fed us well. The poor Italian peasants who began arriving in droves on Ellis Island about 1880 wasted no time in satisfying their hunger and their neighbors”. They set up bakeries and pasta factories, made salami and fresh sausage, planted vineyards and olive groves, and made cheeses more or less like those at home. Some Italian-Americans opened restaurants that served inexpensive, home-style dishes, in a cliched setting of white stucco walls, red-checkered tablecloths, and Chianti wine bottles. Italian-Americans also got their new nation hooked on pizza, once a common snack food only in Naples. And every American home cook learned to make spaghetti, a quick, cheap, and satisfying one-dish meal.