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Beer and Bánh Tráng Day: Vietnam’s Best Pizza PartyDa Nang, Vietnam

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Forget pepperoni and mozzarella. On October 9, International Beer and Pizza Day, we’re raising a frosty glass of bia hơi and tearing into Vietnam’s most underrated street snack – bánh tráng nướng – at a scruffy little student haunt called K298 in Da Nang.

You won’t find wood-fired ovens or sourdough crusts here. Instead, Vietnam’s answer to pizza starts with something beautifully simple: a sheet of rice paper (bánh tráng) laid across a sizzling metal grill until it turns golden and brittle. Then comes the chaos – quail eggs cracked and scrambled on top, dollops of chilli sauce, shredded dried beef (khô bò), spring onions, mayonnaise, sausage, garlic, herbs, and whatever else the chef feels like throwing on that day. It’s street-food roulette, and half the fun is not entirely knowing what you just ordered.

Each disc is crisp and smoky, a riot of textures and flavours that veer between spicy, salty, sweet and umami with every bite. It’s messy, addictive, and so light you’ll be ordering another before you’ve even wiped the sauce off your chin.

Of course, you can’t do International Beer and Pizza Day properly without beer – and in Vietnam, that means bia hơi: draft lager brewed daily, delivered by motorbike in steel kegs, and poured fresh into tiny glasses for about the price of a packet of gum. It’s low in alcohol, a little foamy, and dangerously easy to drink, which is just as well, because the locals keep topping you up before you can say no.

The setting? Well, let’s just say Michelin inspectors aren’t exactly queueing up outside. K298 is a hole-in-the-wall with faded pastel walls and mismatched plastic stools, the kind of place where conversations bounce off the tiles and the smell of grilling rice paper hangs heavy in the air. Students crowd around tables, shouting orders over the clatter of spatulas, and everyone seems to be laughing. It’s loud, chaotic, utterly unpretentious and completely perfect.

So this International Beer and Pizza Day, skip the delivery app and raise a glass of cheap, frosty bia hơi to Vietnam’s crunchy, chaotic, wonderfully improvised take on pizza.

Because sometimes the best slice isn’t served from a pizzeria, it’s grilled over coals on a street corner, with a side of laughter and a dangerously refillable glass.