Pisse Dru wine with pizza

THE PRINCIPLES OF PAIRING

In this article I want to talk about the drink of Bacchus: pizza goes well with wine exactly like any other dish and therefore responds to the same general rules, that is, the criteria of contrast and analogy (or concordance) that must lead to the balance between the sensations of food and those of wine apply. Contrast because some sensations of wine and food balance the imbalances of the other, analogy because in some cases the sensations maintain the same relationship, the same typicality. Combining food and wine basically means looking for a balance from the physical point of view, of the structure. If a wine is too large, intense and persistent, combining it with a food "poor" in sensations will completely overwhelm it. On the other hand, if the wine is too weak and light it will not add anything from the taste-olfactory point of view.

We must therefore look for all the useful factors to build harmony. To better understand, however, we must start from what happens in the mouth when you eat and what is perceived on the tongue thanks to the taste buds. Taste is defined as the set of sensations that are felt in the mouth which are linked both to taste and to olfactory, tactile or thermal stimuli. The taste sensations due to the real taste are four, sweet, salty, sour and bitter, which are perceived in different points of the tongue: the sweet is perceived on the tip, the bitter at the bottom while the acid and salty are perceived laterally. To these must be added today the fifth taste, umami, which represents the "tasty", a savory taste not yet perfectly codified at the level of combination but that we can recognize when we eat products rich in glutamate, an amino acid present in high-protein foods such as Parmigiano Reggiano, raw ham and meat, but also in numerous vegetables. In the mouth you can feel salivation, astringency or pungency, and it is therefore possible to perceive contrasting flavors. Even the times and duration are different, the sweet for example is perceived within a second while the bitter after about three seconds, but remains present longer. Some compounds combine with saliva blocking the lubrication of the entire oral cavity, the resulting sensation is called "astringency" and is due to tannins, mainly present in red wines. The tongue is also able to perceive the shape of a substance, if there are solid particles or if the food is more or less thick, liquid or creamy.

All these sensations combine with each other and influence each other. Each dish has predominant characteristics that, once identified, allow you to choose and match the right wine. These characteristics are, for example, fatness, sweet tendency (which should not be confused with sweetness due to the presence of sugars, but is found in products such as bread, cheese, potatoes), succulence (given by the presence of liquids both within the preparation, such as braised meats, and by salivation that is produced during the chewing of certain foods such as bread or cheese), greasiness, flavor, and many others.

The AIS (Italian Sommelier Association), for example, has developed a descriptive technical sheet in which all the characteristics of the wine and the dish are reported, also evaluated quantitatively with numerical values that will naturally have to compensate to create the gustatory balance. This card is only a tool that must help us in choosing the combination, but we must still trust a priori our taste and what happens in our mouth. Taking into consideration the characteristics of the wine such as acidity, effervescence and flavor we find in their correspondence for the food ("on the other side of the balance") the sensations of fatness and sweet tendency. In fact, acidity is a degreasing agent while flavor counteracts the sweet tendency because a wine with a good flavor makes the combination more pleasant, if a dish is bland.

Alcohol and tannin are above all dehydrating characters, that is, they remove liquid from the oral cavity and therefore contrast with the succulence of food but also with the greasiness which, however viscous, is still liquid. In particular, alcohol plays an important role for succulence as well as tannin for oiliness. To this are added two important factors, namely olfactory intensity and PAI, or intense aromatic persistence, which is the set of sensations that remain after swallowing and that fade more or less slowly. The PAI, to be clear, must be considered when we have to choose a wine in order to balance particularly strong and lasting flavors, such as that of onion. And so on.

Pizza, and more generally all modern cuisine, has lightened in terms of leavening, maturation, ingredients, preparation and cooking; The need therefore arises to have "easy to drink" wines, snappy and not too alcoholic, which do not weigh down the dish in question also by virtue of a possible tasting in which the type of wine is changed several times and passed with a certain nonchalance from a bubble to a rosé, to a white and then to a red depending on the pizza that arrives at the table. In general, pizza is a food with a very strong sweet tendency, due to the dough and cheeses almost always present, more or less structured (we start from "simple" pizzas such as margherita and marinara up to more complex ingredients and preparations and different cooking techniques) where you can find the acidity of the tomato, the aromaticity of the capers, the bitterness of black olives, the savory of a salami and so on. 

According to the principles discussed before, therefore, for fried preparations (both pizzas and appetizers) a bubble, both sparkling, is more than suitable, because it "degreases" and compensates for the high sweet tendency. Champagne, too, is fine with me. For pizzas in which there is tomato, it is preferable to choose a rosé, a sparkling red wine, such as Gragnano or Lambrusco, or even a still red wine with little structure, such as Piedirosso dei Campi Flegrei, Rossese di Dolceacqua or a Pinot Noir. With white pizzas, on the other hand, acidic and fresh white wines are perfect, such as Falanghina, Verdicchio or Chardonnay, which also serve to counteract the fatness of the cheeses.

After going into detail with the general advice, which will allow you to experiment with the types of wine from South to North, I asked the Sommelier of our leavening partner, Moodique, to point out some specific proposals from which to start: With the succulence induced by the crust of fried pizza or calzone I suggest a white supported by the fresh and young aroma, such as Pecorino "Giochiamo con i fiori" by Torre dei Beati, classified as Abruzzo DOC.

Pizza goes very well with red wines, but you should not choose just any. The red wine should be light and fruity to highlight the ingredients that make up the pizza while balancing its fatty side. Too powerful, a wine will completely crush the taste of your pizza — and that's not what I want —. But you can also set your sights on a Beaujolais, Beaujolais-Villages or a cru de Chiroubles, Brouilly or a Saint-Amour. The Côtes du Rhône wines will also be perfect to accompany your pizza especially when your pizza is topped with olives and cold cuts.

I love wines from Beaujolais. They are made with the Gamay grape, and Morgon is one of the ten Beaujolais Crus. Morgon wines are usually denser and richer than the other Beaujolais wines and with luscious dark cherry flavors and an earthy, herbal finish. Pairs best with: A charred Neapolitan pizza topped with roasted vegetables or spicy salami."