Turn the alley to find Phu's restaurant, eat Italian pizza with roast pork and pickled cabbage

In a quiet alley in Phu Tho ward (old district 11), Ho Chi Minh City, Phu's pizza shop is as friendly as a family restaurant, where the young baker puts his heart into each batch of handmade cakes.

Pizza half - half two roast pork and 4 kinds of cheese - Photo: NHA XUAN

For those who come to the restaurant for the first time, Pizza PHU "hidden" in alley 377 Le Dai Hanh can surprise with its simple and intimate space.

Customers sit at stainless steel tables and plastic chairs, enjoying traditional Italian-style Napoli pizza, harmoniously combined with local flavors.

The restaurant space feels like a family restaurant - Photo: NHA XUAN

Italian Pizza with Roast Pork and Pickled Cabbage

The menu is quite simple, basically there is only 1 type of salad and 8 types of pizza: Margherita, seafood, 4 cheese, Hawaiian, carbonara, parma ham & rocket, vegetarian pizza and roast pork with sauerkraut.

The prices are also quite reasonable, pizza has 2 sizes: S (6 pieces) and M (8 pieces), priced from 109,000 to 229,000 VND. Especially, whether size S or M, you can order half - half (2 types of topping on the same pizza).

Although there are few dishes, the menu comes with pictures and full ingredient notes, helping diners easily visualize the taste before ordering.

Seafood pizza with salad at Pizza PHU - Photo: NHA XUAN

For example, the parma ham & rocket pizza has toppings including creamy sauce, mozzarella cheese, parma ham, arugula, grapes (or cherry tomatoes), and balsamic vinegar.

Seafood pizza combines tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, shrimp, squid, purple onion, pesto sauce and lemon zest, impressing with fresh, crispy seafood and the distinctive aroma of pesto and lemon.

However, the "definite" dish that must be mentioned is the roasted pork and sauerkraut pizza. The pizza consists of cream sauce, mozzarella cheese, crispy roasted pork, mushrooms, sauerkraut and chili powder, bringing a strange yet harmonious taste experience, combining fat, crunch, light sourness and mild spiciness.

Roast pork pizza is a must-order dish when coming to the restaurant - Photo: NHA XUAN

“During the recipe testing process, I used many different ingredients and realized that roasted pork has a very unique crispiness. I want each ingredient on the cake to have a highlight: a little crispy, a little sour, and a different texture when eating,” Ho Tuan Phu, owner of Pizza PHU, shared with Tuoi Tre Online.

The 26-year-old owner has adapted the dishes to suit local tastes. “I tried Italian-made pizza, but it was too salty for Vietnamese tastes. My shop is located in an area with mainly Vietnamese and Chinese customers, so I still keep the quality ingredients, but adjust the flavors,” he shared.

Each cake is the result of Phu's meticulousness in his small kitchen - Video : Pizza PHU

Phu’s shop opens from 3:30 PM to 9:30 PM, closed on Tuesdays. Before that, he starts preparing the ingredients early, and starts making the dough around 2 PM. However, the dough was prepared two days before, because it needs to be left to ferment for 48 hours.

With fresh ingredients like shrimp and squid, about every three days, Phu will go to the market to buy a large quantity, bring it home to process, boil it, then divide it into small portions to freeze.

“At first, I was wondering whether I should use frozen shrimp or glass shrimp to ensure stable quality and more controllable prices. But in the end, I still chose fresh shrimp and squid, because traditional Neapolitan-style pizza requires simple ingredients but focuses on the quality of the ingredients. Only then will the flavor of the pizza really stand out,” he said.

Practice spinning pizza with a towel

Phu's journey of learning to make pizza and opening a shop may not be unfamiliar to many people, because the whole process was shared by him on his TikTok channel @Tuanphupastry with more than 24,000 followers.

More than 200 videos recording Phu's journey - from the early days of learning to make cakes, to opening his first shop, studying pizza in depth, and then moving to a new location, have attracted many views and support from the online community.

Viewers loved the young man for his seriousness, perseverance and obvious passion for the profession. However, initially, Phu had no intention of pursuing a career in pizza. In November 2023, he went to study making a variety of European cakes, then worked in the cold kitchen of a bakery.

By chance, Phu and a friend participated in a pizza making contest “for fun” and won first prize. However, Phu said that at that time he was not really into pizza, until he watched videos about Napoli pizza and started to get inspired.

Phu said, the characteristic of Napoli pizza is... its difficulty, because it requires a long fermentation time, the crust is puffy and soft, the outside is crispy, the inside has a slightly sour taste, and especially the crust must be spongy and airless.

The small kitchen space where Phu makes his own signature pizzas - Photo: NHA XUAN

For several months, whenever he had free time, Phu practiced shaping, flipping, and rotating pizzas with... towels. On weekends, when he had more time, he practiced with dough. In October 2024, after quitting his job as a cold bakery, Phu opened his first pizza shop.

Phu said there were days when he had to stop selling, or had to give customers a 50% discount because the batch of dough was not up to standard. Then, due to a lack of staff, he struggled alone, making customers wait for up to an hour for a pizza.

But things gradually got back on track, the shop had more staff, the menu went from four original pizzas to eight now. The oven in the open kitchen still baked pizzas every afternoon, bringing with it the happiness of the person who made delicious pizzas for customers.

Phu's video series "The days it takes to make a delicious pizza" that once attracted attention on TikTok has been answered, but he still dreams of a bigger shop and his own pizza classes in the future.

Back to topic

NHA XUAN

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/queo-hem-tim-quan-cua-phu-an-pizza-y-vi-heo-quay-cai-chua-20250727191256728.htm