Thursday, February 11, 2010

Wine That Loves Pizza

Not too long ago, Elizabeth and I were at Cost Plus and came across a bottle of wine called "Wine That Loves Pizza."  While I admired the lack of pretension, I laughed once and moved on. But Elizabeth had heard good things about the wine and asked if I wanted to try it. I took a closer look. Besides being an attractive, sleek-looking bottle, the back label provided a crib sheet of sorts, listing why this wine pairs well with pizza. I would be lying if I didn't admit the price also caught my eye: it cost $3.97. 

Last night our friend Murph stopped by to have pizza with us. I cooked two mini pizzas from Trader Joe's - their Bella Napoli pepperoni pizza. I used to eat these frequently a few years ago and then, for no particular reason, I stopped. I returned to them a month ago and cannot understand why I ever stopped eating them: they are great. They come four to a pack and one makes a great snack or appetizer; a couple make a full meal. 

I also rolled out some fresh dough from Fresh & Easy and bisected several meatballs that were left over from the day before. I used Fresh & Easy pizza sauce, fresh mozzarella, and for the last couple minutes of cooking I added some chopped parsley. I had gone easy on the sauce and heavy on the cheese and the whole thing was good but a bit too bland, so I added several slugs of Louisiana hot sauce to my slices. 

I expected my first sip of the wine to be lousy, like the Charles Shaw I loathe. (A friend of mine told me that Two Buck Chuck is hit-or-miss and sometimes you will get a good bottle, but it's yet to happen for me.) But this was actually delicious. It's got very little depth (not terribly surprising for a $4 wine) but plenty of flavor, and not the too-sweet flavor of cheap wine. Most importantly, it indeed complemented the pizza. 

There are a few other varieties of this wine (Wine That Loves Roasted Chicken, Wine That Loves Pasta with Tomato Sauce, Wine That Loves Grilled Steak, etc.) I will definitely try the rest of them. 

7 comments:

Nosh Gnostic said...

I'm looking forward to the release of Wine That Loves Prune Danish. For this I would gladly fork over $4.00.
I'll be having with lunch today Wine That Loves Peanut Butter & Jelly. Oddly,it compliments apricot preserves better than my old grape jelly stand-by. Go figure...

BigNightFan said...

I will check this out, thanks. I also stumbled upon Fess Parker's Frontier Red, CA Red Wine. It sounds hokey, but is the best under-$10 bottle of wine I've had...

JustinM said...

Good tip. I haven't had any Fess Parker in almost 9 years.

Trader Joe's has a couple cheap wines I love - the Trentatre and Oreanna (?), which are both around 6 dollars. (But I have yet to have a Charles Shaw that I thought was any good.)

Cafe Pasadena said...

I'm more concerned about me loving the pizza rather than the wine. But, I'll consider your words here.

JustinM said...

I think you would enjoy my homemade pizzas, Cafe.

Unknown said...

Found your blog when searching King Arthur's pizza -- I too still mourn the loss!

If you ever make it out to the beach, try this place - it's probably the best I've found (not as good as King Arthur's, but nothing is or probably ever will be):
http://www.freshbrothers.com/

JustinM said...

Yeah, no kidding. That place was so great. Thanks for the tip about Fresh Brothers. It's very rare I make it out to those beach cities (there is nothing in the world I hate more than looking for parking) but next time I am, I will check this out.

The closest I have ever found to King Arthur's is the Mountain Mike's chain in Northern California. The sauce is very close. Alas, the crust isn't as good.