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Ambrogio15 Enoteca debuts in La Jolla

Wine and charcuterie at Ambrogio Enoteca, a new Italian wine bar and market in La Jolla.
(Courtesy of Roman Durta)
By Pam Kragen
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Ambrogio15 Enoteca, an Italian wine bar, bottle shop and gourmet market, opened last month in the former Ciao Ciao Piadina space in La Jolla.

The new Enoteca is owned by Giacomo Pizzigoni and Andrea Burrone of the Milano Five restaurant group, which also operates the Acquerello by Ambrogio restaurant in La Jolla and Ambrogio15 pizzerias in Pacific Beach, Little Italy, Del Mar and Scottsdale, Ariz.

Burrone and Pizzigoni were also investors in the former Ciao Ciao Piadina, an Italian aperitivo and sandwich shop that opened in April 2021 but closed this past June. Pizzigoni said the aperitivo spot didn’t catch on with La Jolla diners, but he and Burrone believe the neighborhood was missing a gourmet wine bar.

Ambrogio Enoteca has a 25-seat wine bar with a selection of 200 wines from boutique Italian vineyards. About 90 percent of the wines are biodynamic (made without chemicals and composts) and many come from wineries that make from 140 to 2,000 bottles or less each season. Wines sell for $20 to $400 a bottle. The wines are available by the glass or flight with optional cold cut and cheese boards with burrata, prosciutto, mortadella and more. Monthly wine events are planned with Italian winemakers.

The shop has been decorated to look like someone’s home living room rather than a tasting room. It also has a small Italian grocery market area, serving imported items such as olive oils, honeys, jams, aged Balsamic vinegar, cold cuts and cheeses, as well as fresh Ambrogio pastas and sauces to go.

Hours are 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays at 510 Pearl St., La Jolla. Visit ambrogio15enotecasd.com.

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Pam Kragen

Pam Kragen is the arts and entertainment editor, as well as the chief theater, dining and opera critic, for the San Diego Union-Tribune. She joined the Union-Tribune staff in October 2012 after 27 years at the North County Times, where she served as the Arts & Features Editor, as well as the paper’s longtime arts writer and theater and opera critic. She is the co-founder of the San Diego Theatre Critics Circle. She holds a bachelor of arts degree in journalism from San Diego State University and completed fellowships in theater criticism at the University of Southern California and opera-classical music criticism at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. And in 2022, she was chosen as one of the fellows in the prestigious National Critics Institute, run by the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center in Waterf, Conn.

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