Oscar’s Pizza, a new pizzeria named for Highland Brewing founder Oscar Wong, will soft open on Highland’s 40-acre Asheville campus during the brewery’s 30th anniversary Cold Mountain weekend, Nov. 13-15, 2026. A full menu follows the week of Thanksgiving, and a grand opening is planned for December, according to Highland’s press release.
The Bureau has studied many Earth tributes. Statues, plaques, scholarships. Naming a pizza oven after someone is rarer, and frankly warmer.
Who Oscar Wong was
Wong was a 54-year-old retired engineer in 1994 when he started brewing Gaelic Amber Ale, Asheville’s first craft beer, on refurbished dairy equipment in the basement of Barley’s, a downtown pub. WLOS notes that Barley’s was also known for its pizza. Wong became known as the Godfather of Asheville craft beer, and he died in 2025.
He was one of the craft beer pioneers of the American South, and his commitment to high-quality beer was matched by the care he showed for his community, our staff, our family and the people he mentored. Oscar’s Pizza is one way that we can keep nourishing our community in his memory.
Leah Wong Ashburn, Wong’s daughter and Highland’s president and CEO
The release also tells a story the Bureau has filed under essential human data. Wong first encountered pizza after immigrating from Jamaica to attend the University of Notre Dame in the 1950s. Not knowing what to do with the box, he carried it home sideways under his arm. Highland says Oscar’s Pizza honors him in personal ways, including on the box.
An entire civilization relies on a flat cardboard square, and nobody explains how to hold it. From an alien anthropological perspective, this checks out.
The menu also borrows from Wong’s heritage. Highland names a chili-crisp and jerk-seasoned meatball pizza among the pies.
What Oscar’s Pizza will serve
Oscar’s Pizza will make thin, crispy pies from scratch, plus salads and shareables. Guest Experience Director Chris Genua is developing the concept with Head Chef Adam Jones.
Genua, a first-generation Italian American from Philadelphia, learned pizza with his family, spent 12 years in New York’s restaurant scene, including six as opening general manager of Brooklyn’s The Double Windsor, and led the pizza concept at White Labs Brewing Co. in Asheville. At Oscar’s, he is aiming for his take on New Haven-style pizza.
Oscar’s brings all of those influences together in a thin, crispy, charred pie meant to be shared with friends over a few Highland beers.
Chris Genua, guest experience director, Highland Brewing
Jones, a native of Hickory, N.C., came to Asheville for culinary school and has since cooked in Asheville, Charleston, Denver and Dallas, including opening new concepts and running high-volume kitchens, per the release.
Pairing pies with Highland beer
The menu is built to pair with Highland regulars, and staff will offer pairing suggestions. The release names three:
- Gaelic Amber Ale, the 1994 original
- AVL IPA
- Highland Pilsner
Readers who need a refresher on Gaelic Ale’s mascot can consult the Bureau’s field report on Scotty’s return.
A growing Highland campus
Oscar’s Pizza joins a campus that Highland describes as a gathering place for beer, live music, outdoor recreation and events. Black Dome Outfitters recently opened a retail shop there. Cultivate Climbing plans to expand on the campus with a 20,000-square-foot rope-climbing facility with 45-foot walls; that one is still a plan, not an open gym.
Highland has served as a community mothership before, as the Bureau noted in its report on how Highland weathered Hurricane Helene. A pizzeria named for the man who started it all fits that pattern.
Highland has not yet published hours or menu prices for Oscar’s Pizza. The Bureau will update its star charts when it does.
BEERALIEN.COM | Reporting on Earth’s finest craft beers from a galaxy far, far away.
BeerAlien
Raymond
Terry Bunch
