Zalat Pizza opens in Duncanville today, Monday, October 12, and it is a milestone. The new shop at 325 S. Cedar Ridge Drive, in the Cedar Park Shopping Center near Wheatland Road, is the 30th Zalat in Texas.
That number still takes some getting used to. Khanh Nguyen, a former attorney, opened his Vietnamese restaurant DaLat on Fitzhugh Avenue in 2012. When the space next door came open, he turned it into a late-night pizza window for the cooks, servers and bartenders who get off work when most kitchens are closed. That was the first Zalat, in 2015. CraveDFW had the very first slice to come out of that oven, and it is hard to believe how far that little shop has come. With Duncanville, there are now 22 Zalats around Dallas-Fort Worth, six in Houston and two in Austin.
Nguyen has said Duncanville appealed to him as a fresh corner of Dallas County, with a hometown that turns out for Duncanville Panthers football. Expect plenty of game-night orders. The location takes over a former pizza shop in the strip anchored by ALDI, and it debuts a refreshed look for the brand along with a new slogan, Worth It.
The menu is the full Zalat lineup, which means the pies people actually line up for. The Pho Shizzle is a pizza inspired by Vietnamese pho, a nod to where Zalat started. The Sweet Revenge, the Pineapple Express, the Elote and the Bacon Cheddar Ranch all have their loyalists, and the newest pie on the board is Butter Chicken. Every pepperoni pizza uses all-beef pepperoni. And if you are feeling brave, there is the Reaper Roulette challenge, where one unmarked slice in the pie is nuclear-level spicy and nobody knows which one until it is too late.
True to its roots, Zalat stays open late. The Duncanville shop is set to run 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 4 a.m. on Friday and Saturday, and 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Sunday.
Zalat Pizza Duncanville is at 325 S. Cedar Ridge Drive. Order online or find every location at zalatpizza.com.
