Iowa's First Cowboy Chicken Restaurant To Open Tuesday In Ankeny (Updated)

ANKENY, IA. -- A Texas-based restaurant that features wood-fired rotisserie chicken on view and meals complemented by homemade side dishes will make its Iowa debut in Ankeny this week. The restaurant, Cowboy Chicken, is undergoing a national expansion and the Ankeny location at 802 S.E. Oralabor Road will be the 20th in six states for the chain. It opens at 11 a.m. Tuesday.

Omaha-based FRC Group will operate the restaurant, which is the first of 14 Cowboy Chicken locations it intends to open in Iowa, Kansas and South Dakota. FRC has been in the restaurant business for 30 years with a variety of restaurants throughout the Midwest.

“Cowboy Chicken is dedicated to exceeding guests’ expectations each time they visit, and we are excited to bring our bold flavors and wholesome ingredients to the Ankeny community,” said Sean Kennedy, Cowboy Chicken’s president and CEO, in a news release.

(For more local news, sign up for real-time news alerts and newsletters from Ankeny Patch. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

The Cowboy Chicken menu features all-natural, hormone-free rotisserie chickens that are hand-seasoned in store, marinated for 24 hours and then slow roasted for two hours over a real wood-burning fire, the company said. Other dishes include signature sour cream tomatillo chicken enchiladas, made-from-scratch sides and seasonal cobblers baked in-house daily.

The Ankeny restaurant centers on the wood-burning rotisserie where guests can view the chickens roasting from the rustic-meets-modern dining area with wood-style laminate floors and a custom multi-media art installation. The 2,500-square-foot restaurant seats 69 guests.

Cowboy Chicken is a fast-casual restaurant founded in Dallas in 1981. In 2017 it won the Emerging Chain of the Year award from Restaurant Business and was named one of the Top 25 Most Loved Brands by Foodable.

Ankeny's Cowboy Chicken will be open 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily. The restaurant also offers delivery and catering, plus online ordering and order-ahead options via an online app. A week-long grand opening celebration with daily discounts and promotions will take place in November.

Image courtesy of Cowboy Chicken