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Wine for pizza: acidity for the tomato, and a wine for every pizza

For pizza with tomato sauce, a red with high acidity and medium body: Sangiovese (the Chianti grape), Montepulciano, Barbera, or a Lambrusco. Tomato is acidic, and the wine needs acidity so it doesn't taste flat next to it. Calabresa, four cheese and white pizza call for other routes.

Why acidity

It's the rule the WSET calls acid with acid: acidic food makes wine seem less acidic, so a high-acid wine can stand up to tomato. If the wine has less acidity than the dish, Wine Folly warns, it tastes flat. That's why Chianti, with its marked acidity, turns up with pizza, tomato sauce and lasagna in Fiona Beckett's guides.

Pizza by pizza

  • Mozzarella (plain cheese): the red sauce is the star, and Wine Folly suggests Montepulciano or a Grenache, Syrah and Mourvèdre blend.
  • Margherita: light ingredients and basil: a light red, like Garnacha, or a dry rosé. The Lambrusco Consortium suggests Salamino di Santa Croce, which matches the sweetness of the tomato.
  • Calabresa (Brazil's smoked-sausage pizza) and pepperoni: the fat spreads the flavor across the whole pizza; go for an intensely flavored wine, like Sangiovese or Cabernet Franc (Wine Folly). If it's spicy, the WSET rule helps: high alcohol turns up the burn and a touch of sweetness calms it down. A red with moderate alcohol or a Lambrusco amabile.
  • Four cheese: Lambrusco di Sorbara, with fresh acidity and light bubbles, contrasts with the fat, according to the Lambrusco Consortium.
  • White pizza (with a creamy sauce): Pinot Noir or Chardonnay, which go along with the cream.

Lambrusco, the Italian answer

The director of the Lambrusco Consortium says it goes with any pizza; the consortium suggests serving it at 8 to 10 °C. At a tasting in Italy in 2011, a jury of critics voted Lambrusco the best wine for pizza out of seven tested. In Naples, the Neapolitan pizza association calls pizza with Gragnano, a wine from Campania, “the pairing of tradition”. And sparkling wine works too: it cleans the palate the way beer does.

To start with: the house's wines by price range

The price range the house saw at big stores in Brazil, in the month shown. The price changes; the range tends to stay.

Reds the database marks for pasta and pizza

See all the pizza wines in the search →

No red: white, rosé and sparkling for pasta and pizza

See all the pasta and pizza wines in the search →

Everything here is a suggestion, not a law: pairing is a suggestion. Liked it another way? Then you can, and it's great that you found out what you like.

In the search: type “wine for pizza” or “lambrusco”. And the Festinha does the math for pizza night.

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Sources for this page

  • WSET, Winter wine and food matching (2020): acid with acid, sweet with sweet, fat with acid — wsetglobal.com
  • Wine Folly, Food and wine pairing basics: a wine less acidic than the food tastes flat — winefolly.com
  • Matching Food & Wine (Fiona Beckett): Chianti and Sangiovese, with tomato, pizza, ragù and lasagna — matchingfoodandwine.com
  • Wine Folly, Pizza wine: mozzarella, margherita, pepperoni and white pizza — winefolly.com
  • Wine Folly: the Barbera and Montepulciano profiles — winefolly.com
  • Quotidiano di Sicilia, on the Consorzio Tutela Lambrusco: Sorbara with four cheese, Salamino with margherita, 8 to 10 °C — qds.it
  • Quotidiano.net, Pizza Day (2026): Lambrusco with every pizza, according to the consortium's director — quotidiano.net
  • Scatti di Gusto: at Enologica 2011, Lambrusco voted the best wine for pizza — scattidigusto.it
  • Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana (2014): pizza with Gragnano, the pairing of tradition — pizzanapoletana.org
  • WSET, A flavourful affair: pairing Indian food with wine (2023): alcohol turns up the burn; a touch of sweetness balances it — wsetglobal.com
  • Wine Folly: sparkling cleans the palate the way beer does — winefolly.com

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