Rockford’s Five Best ‘Old-School Italian’ Restaurants

I love national lists that always seem to forget Rockford has some awesome food.

It's tough, I've said it before and I'll say it again, with Chicago in Illinois, a ton of the national blog sites will always use the Windy City as the spot for the state's "Best" whatever that may be.

I like to use the Rockford snub on the national blog sites as motivation to hook you up with what the rest of the country is missing out on. In this case, I saw the 50 Best Old-School Italian Restaurants in America on Cheapism and thought, "I wonder what Rockford's best old-school joints might be?".

With a bit of help from Yelp, I figured it out. I simply typed in "Old School Italian" and the popular review site spat out the five best:

1. Franchesco's Ristorante
2. Lino's
3. Capri Restaurant & Pizza
4. Gulotta's Pizza
5. Gerry's Pizza

All five of the restaurants listed have great pizza and they all exude old-school Italian charm you won't find anywhere else, so there's not much to complain about when it comes to this list, but is your favorite place missing?

What is your favorite place for old-school Italian in Rockford?

Sweet Lenny is the brand manager of 97ZOK, Q98.5, and Operations Manager for Townsquare Media Rockford. Catch him afternoons 3 to 7 on 97ZOK. Follow him on Twitter, Instagram and like his page on Facebook.