Born in Bari, Italy, on the east side of the “boot,” Rita is the youngest of ten children born into a family with a deep appreciation for the culinary arts. She also lived in both Naples and La Spezia (near Genoa), where she developed a familiarity of the abundance of foods from these vastly different regions.

The budding young food fan came to the United States at the age of eleven, immigrating to Philadelphia with her parents and five of her siblings. After the Romano roots were firmly re-planted in the US, Rita learned about American food by working for the Airlines in the food department after she graduated from high school.

Upgrading to a position of supervisor for Alitalia Airlines offered Rita the opportunity to travel back and forth between the US and Europe, where she especially enjoyed frequent visits home to Italy. She passionately seized the chance to take advantage of experiencing the culinary creativity of two entirely different worlds.

When in 1980 Rita moved to Phoenix, Arizona she continued to travel often to Italy, maintaining an executive position in the airline industry. She continued to expand and spread her culinary wings. Rita’s proficiency at creating amazing culinary marvels continued to grow.

In 1990 Rita opened and operated three Italian restaurants in the Phoenix and Scottsdale area specializing in pasta. Her restaurants offered 31 delicious sauces for pasta that the enthusiastic Italian chef had developed. Encouraged by the ardent fervor of her customers to share her recipes - as well as her knowledge and skill of Italian food, Rita began writing cookbooks.

Within two years, Rita had published her first cookbook and started her Italian cooking school. She has been featured in the Arizona Republic, Arizona Woman magazine, the Moon Valley Phoenix Advent, and Camelback Corridor News. Rita’s Cooking Class has been featured on KPNX-TV (the Phoenix NBC affiliate), and she has been a guest on Valley Dish TV Show WKRC- TV12 with Tram Mai. KSAZ-TV (the Phoenix Fox affiliate) with Rick D’Amico. She was also on Kids can Cook Too, a program that aired on KNAZ-TV (Cable Channel 22 in Arizona).

She is the acclamated author of Sauces for Pasta Lovers, Italian Entrees for Protein Lovers, Ciao Tesoro: Treasures from Italian Kitchen, and now just released, Italian Gluten Free Gastronomy and (published in Italy) Italiana.cucina natural senza glutine