Peroni Beer

Peroni is the beer that has stood for Italian lager longer than Italy has had Rome as its capital: Francesco Peroni opened the family brewery in Vigevano, in Lombardy, in 1846. The pale, easy-drinking lager that carries the family name is still one of Italy's most popular beers, the everyday counterpart to its glossier sibling Nastro Azzurro.

The business moved south when Giovanni Peroni established operations in Rome in 1864 — six years before the city became the Italian capital — and the company grew with the new nation into its leading brewer. In 1963 it launched Nastro Azzurro ("Blue Ribbon"), a premium lager named in honor of the Blue Riband speed record won by the Italian ocean liner SS Rex in 1933.

Peroni changed hands in 2016, when regulators required the merging AB InBev and SABMiller to divest it; Asahi bought the brand and has run Birra Peroni since. In Italy, Peroni remains the standard bar-counter lager; abroad, the Peroni name increasingly rides on Nastro Azzurro's fashion-adjacent image.

Crisp and dry, with light biscuity malt, a whisper of herbal hops, and brisk carbonation that suits it to pizza and the aperitivo hour.