Oradea-based pizzaiolo Cristian Meleaca won first place in the 'Pizza & Wine' category at the World Pizza Championship - Trofeo Caputo, recently held in Naples and bringing together more than 600 competitors from 35 countries.

With nearly three decades of experience and after 15 years of collaboration with his mentor and competition coach Eugen Pocian, Meleaca reached the world finals for the fourth consecutive year. His success in Naples came in the 'Pizza & Wine' category, introduced only last year and regarded as one of the most demanding sections of the competition.

'For the past four years we have been preparing consistently for this competition. This is our fourth world championship final, but before getting there you have to go through numerous contests and qualifying stages. We have won many other competitions in different countries. This Pizza & Wine category is the most difficult contest in the championship,' Eugen Pocian told AGERPRES.

The main challenge consisted in creating a pairing between a wine selected by the organisers and a pizza capable of perfectly complementing it.

After being assigned a rose wine from the Campania region, the Oradea team chose ingredients that would enhance the wine's flavours. They also benefited from the advice of the team's sommelier, who recommended a simpler composition to preserve the balance between the dish and the wine.

'This category is all about the balance between pizza and wine. Technique matters, but the most important thing is achieving perfect harmony between the two. Participants only find out which wine they have been assigned 24 hours before the contest. And within the seven minutes allocated to the event, they must prepare and present their creation to the jury. Since it was a rose, we thought it would pair very well with fish,' Meleaca explained to AGERPRES.

For the winning recipe, the Oradea pizzaiolo used a direct dough matured for 24 hours with 68% hydration and a shrimp bisque base instead of the traditional tomato sauce. The pizza was topped with yellow datterini tomatoes and, after baking, finished with stracciatella cheese, Cantabrian anchovy fillets and grated Sorrento lemon zest.

Competing in the World Pizza Championship requires meticulous logistics, as participants must provide their own ingredients, with the exception of flour. Some of them were transported from Romania under special conditions, including the shrimp sauce used for the award-winning pizza, which was prepared in Romania, frozen and carried to Naples in a thermal container.

At the competition in Italy, Meleaca also competed in the Nations event as a member of Romania's national team and took part in the 'Seasonal Pizza' and 'STG Pizza - Traditional Speciality Guaranteed' categories, the latter being the championship's most prestigious section.

In parallel with Meleaca's success, Eugen Pocian received a special diploma and the title of 'Ambassador of Excellence' in recognition of his role in promoting Neapolitan pizza and Italian gastronomy internationally. In recent years, he has served as the Association of Neapolitan Pizzaioli's brand ambassador in Romania.

Now in its 23rd edition, the World Pizzaiuolo Championship is the only international competition of its kind hosted in Naples, the city where the art of pizza-making has been inscribed on UNESCO's intangible cultural heritage list. This year's event, held at Mostra d'Oltremare, brought together more than 600 participants from 35 countries competing in 14 categories. AGERPRES (RO - writing by: Eugenia Pasca; EN - writing by: Simona Iacob)