Wine Country Restaurants: Rosso Pizzeria and Wine Bar
Nineteen new restaurants were added to the San Francisco Chronicle’s list of the Top 100 restaurants in the Bay Area. One of the new restaurants is Rosso Pizzeria and Wine Bar in Santa Rosa. That puts this restaurant in the Creekside strip mall in the company of such fine North Bay restaurants as Cyrus in Healdsburg, Farmhouse Inn in Forestville, Nick’s Cove in Marshall , Café La Haye in Sonoma and five restaurants in the Napa Valley.
Like most pizzerias, you can have a sit down meal in a very nice, calm setting or you can get takeout. However, this pizzeria has much more than just good pizza so you may want to have a sit down meal, though sometimes it’s quite a long wait for a table since they only take reservations for larger parties.
This is a foodie’s restaurant. John Franchetti, who worked at Tra Vigne in the Napa Valley before starting this restaurant, is the chef and part owner. The philosophy of the owners of Rosso is clearly influenced by the Slow Food Movement. The pizzas are thin crust Neapolitan style with tasty but restrained toppings – none of those thick crust, big, goppy pizzas here. Most of the pizzas have either a red base (homemade tomato sauce and garlic) or a white base (garlic and oregano) with toppings that include foods such as Point Reyes blue cheese, spaghetti and homemade meatballs, prosciutto, artichokes, shiitake mushrooms and other kinds of cheeses. It’s mouthwatering just reading the menu and the taste is just scrumptious.
Rosso makes their own burrata, a cheese made from mozzarella and cream. They make their own cured meats (salumni), like prosciutto, which change daily and can be ordered as a separate dish. The menu includes several antipasti, several inventive salads and piadine, which is sort of a pizza salad – a flat bread with salad toppings.
By the way, the Rosso web site indicates that they are going to have a wine club that has wine tastings both at Rosso and at local wineries.
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