"My main focus was always Italian cooking, my way."Photo: Melissa Hom

Age: 35

Restaurant: PT

Background: Milazzo’s career has taken him through some of the most famous restaurants in Europe, most notably (and recently) Alain Ducasse’s three-star Louis XV restaurant in the Hotel de Paris in Monte Carlo, where he was saucier. (He also worked at the two-star Tantris, in Munich.) But when he wanted to come to New York, Milazzo contacted East Village pizza master Federico Carlucci of Gnocco. Carlucci introduced him to the owner of PT, where Milazzo now runs the kitchen.