322. Slow Food and Sustainability

Listen to Gerardo Moceri Jr., co-owner of Gerardo’s Pizzeria in Sedona, Arizona, on The Hot Slice Podcast with Pizza Today.

What does it look like when the second generation of a pizzeria learns about the Slow Food movement and brings sustainable practices back to the family business? In the case of Gerardo Moceri Jr., it means stone-milled flour made from ancient grains, house-made mozzarella and a Snail of Approval.

In this episode of The Hot Slice podcast, we sit down with Gerardo Jr., who earned a degree in sustainability from Arizona State University and studied at Italy’s University of Gastronomic Sciences. He’s used the experience to improve the product and customer experience at the family-owned wood-fired pizzeria by deepening the commitment to regenerative agriculture and turning the restaurant into a working teaching kitchen for culinary interns.

Here's what Gerardo Jr. discusses:

• The Snail of Approval: What the Slow Food movement’s recognition means for a pizzeria and how it shapes everyday sourcing decisions.
• Flour first: Why he blends a stone-milled desert heritage wheat with a regeneratively farmed flour and what it does for dough hydration and flavor.
• Making mozzarella in-house: The labor, the craft and why it creates more menu flexibility than buying it ready-made.
• Sustainability in practice: Composting programs, recycled packaging and how to build greener operations incrementally without tanking your margins.
• Working with local farmers: Balancing menu consistency with seasonal availability, and why flexibility is the key to avoiding food waste.
• The teaching kitchen: How paid culinary internships pass down skills and fight kitchen burnout.
• Second-generation ownership: Bringing new ideas to a family business and why his parents’ openness made all the difference.
• The long game: His vision of a morning-to-night destination serving pastries, focaccia sandwiches and wood-fired pizza in the heart of West Sedona.