Houston residents Mustafa Khaliq and Zakir Seyar drove 5 hours to Dallas on Friday morning, just for spicy fried chicken.
“We’re not eating anything until we get to Dave’s,” Khaliq told a friend this morning. When they arrived at Dave’s Hot Chicken, they each devoured a Combo No. 3 — one chicken tender and one chicken-tender slider with kale slaw, fries on the side.
Khaliq and Seyar were among the hundreds of customers who lined up inside and outside the restaurant on opening day, eager to get a taste from the first Dave’s Hot Chicken in Texas. It’s located on Preston Road, near Spring Valley Road, in Far North Dallas. Local franchisees David Futrell, Ernest Crawford and Ryan Binkley have secured the rights to open 10 Dave’s Hot Chickens in Dallas County, making Dave’s the most quickly-expanding Nashville hot chicken brand in D-FW. And that’s saying something, because D-FW is on fire with Nashville hot chicken.
All of Dave’s Hot Chicken’s four Armenian co-owners were in Dallas on opening day, including its unassuming celebrity, California chef and Dave’s namesake Dave Kopushyan. The four co-owners lucked in to chicken royalty by serving simple, good food.
The Texas store is the 14th one so far, and the co-founders still seem to be feeling some pinch-me moments as they watch their company explode.
It’s a great story, to be sure: Dave’s Hot Chicken started in a parking lot in East Hollywood, Calif., in May 2017, where the guys scraped together $900 to buy a fryer and some chicken. For months, they worked underneath a pop-up tent in the parking lot each night, gaining a loyal following while keeping their costs low. In January 2018, they moved into a real restaurant and kept cooking.
By September 2019, Kopushyan and the crew opened their first franchise restaurant. They’re supported by Bill Phelps, co-founder of Wetzel’s Pretzels, and John Davis, a movie producer whose credits include Grumpy Old Men, Dr. Doolittle, I, Robot, and dozens of others. (There’s an only-in-Los-Angeles backstory worth telling: Davis left his phone number on a sticky note at the first Dave’s Hot Chicken restaurant, asking them to please reach out. “I guess we’ll call him,” says one co-founder, and the rest is history.)
Davis and Phelps are helping the team scale the business across North America. Phelps says at the Dallas opening that Dave’s “is the best fast food I’ve ever tasted in my life.”
So far, Phelps and Davis have sold the franchise rights to open 405 Dave’s Hot Chicken restaurants. It’s fast and furious: Dave’s will open one restaurant a week for the remainder of the year.
In Dallas, they’re zeroing in on East Dallas, Grand Prairie and Richardson. Dave’s Hot Chicken will open in Richardson Restaurant Park, the strip center on the Central Expressway frontage road anchored by OMG Tacos and Dog Haus Biergarten, in 2022. The other locations are still being decided.
To expedite orders, Dave’s Hot Chicken will add drive-throughs at some locations. The Far North Dallas restaurant is their first.
The line was dozens of cars long on opening day, and five workers stood outside, directing traffic and taking orders. The wait time was a mere 10 or 15 minutes for those who went inside the restaurant at lunchtime. (Pro tip: Walk inside if the drive-through seems long.)
Dave’s has a tiny menu, with just three options: Combo No. 1, No. 2 or No. 3, each variations of chicken-tender sliders or straight-up chicken tenders, available in seven spice levels. Most opt for medium or hot, says co-founder Arman Oganesyan. Those who pick the hottest level, “reaper,” have to sign a literal waiver.
The tenders are plump and juicy, with a thin, fried exterior dyed red from cayenne.
Thank goodness namesake Dave Kopushyan is not a vegetarian anymore, one of his friends muses: He worked at a vegetarian restaurant before they started frying chicken a few years back.
When Kopushyan eats his own food, he orders a medium chicken tender and an extra hot slider, then puts honey and extra Dave’s Sauce on the sandwich, which already comes stacked with kale slaw and pickles.
“Every time I eat it,” he says in between bites, “I’m like, ‘Wow. This is so good.’”
The first Dave’s Hot Chicken in Texas is at 14750 Preston Road (between Spring Valley and Belt Line roads), Dallas. It opened May 28, 2021.
