There is an animating principle driving my passion for cooking that is pretty simple. I’m driven to learn how to cook things that I like to eat. In truth, there are many, many things that I like to eat that I’ve never managed to cook, but well pizza is another thing. There is something about the mechanics of rendering delicious pizza that appeal to the artist and engineer in me. Having the good fortune to develop knowhow of smoke-kissed wood oven cooking has deepened my enthusiasm. Pizza kind of owns me.
Many food preparations help one build flavor (think sauces, braises, marinades, spice rubs). Pizza, with it’s platform of dough, though, provides a distinct opportunity to build flavor from the ground up. Learning to hand mix and nurture a model of pizza dough has been an exciting mix of form and function, where flavor, touch, elasticity and texture provide a savory canvas. I won’t claim that my dough is the universal ‘perfect’ medium for pizza. What I can say is that it provides a yeasty and pliable stage that enable the accumulation of an array of enticing tastes, which leads to a robust and accessible impression of flavors.
Good pizza naturally invites many wine companions to the table. We think our lushly flavored and compellingly complex 2021 Estate Syrah readily qualifies. With its ample dark berry fruitiness that is shadowed by our Estate vineyard’s signature mix of exotic spice notes and strands of smoke and olive tapenade, it embraces the spirit of a well conceived pie. We hope that you agree.
