New Restaurant: We Checked out Dave’s Hot Chicken in Billings

Dave's Hot Chicken opened in Billings on December 2.

We wrote about the arrival of Billings' newest fast-casual restaurant a few weeks ago, and have been anticipating a chance to try Dave's Hot Chicken ever since. The opportunity presented itself a day before the official opening date.

I was running errands in Shiloh Crossing on Friday (12/1) around noon and was pulling into the Taco Johns parking lot to grab some lunch when I noticed a line of cars moving through Dave's Hot Chicken drive-through. "Sorry, TJ's... you'll have to wait", I thought, backing out of the lot. "Spicy chicken is what I'm having today."

A basic menu.

There were three cars in front of me when I pulled up and the line was moving fairly quickly. Approaching the order board, you're faced with basically four meal options; all feature a combo of sliders, tenders, or both. For example, a #1 is two tenders with fries. The #2 is two sliders with fries.  I chose the #3 which is one tender and one slider with fries ($12.99) and added a medium Coke.

It's a lot of food.

The friendly employee handed me my order and the bag seemed heavy. "This feels like a lot of food", I thought as I cruised through the Scheels parking lot and parked by the little pond behind the store. There was no way I could wait to drive all the way home to enjoy this food. I like things hot and fresh and for this review, I needed to get that hot chicken in my mouth ASAP.

The tenders are huge.

In hindsight, I could have ordered the single slider and fries combo and been completely satisfied. The all-white-meat chicken tenders at Dave's are large, easily dwarfing the bun on the slider. I ordered it as it comes, topped with coleslaw, pickles, and sauce. Dave's offers every tender on a heat scale of "none" to "reaper".

I chose extra hot, the second hottest option. After the first few bites, the heat started to creep into my mouth. Halfway through the sandwich I was reaching for my first sip of Coke to cool things off a little. The sweetness of the coleslaw and bun provided a cool balance to the overall spiciness of the sandwich. Dave's extra hot sandwich seemed about twice as hot as Wendy's spicy chicken to my palette.

How hot is hot?

Finished with the sandwich, I moved on to the tender (also "extra hot"). Without the balance of the sweet sandwich toppings, I could really taste the heat here. The solo tender also provided a better examination of the breading, which is thin and crispy (almost like thin, crackle-crisp, fried chicken skin). It was dusted with a seasoning rub that gave a hint of sweet-and-smoky before the hotness kicked in.

Dave's Hot Chicken serves crinkle-cut fries.

I'm not usually a huge fan of crinkle-cut fries because to me they always seem soggy. However, these were crisp and satisfying. They were sprinkled with a hint of seasoning that didn't seem to offer much additional flavor, but perhaps I couldn't taste it because my mouth was still smoldering from the hot chicken.

Overall, as someone who loves spicy foods, I was impressed by the meal at Dave's Hot Chicken. It will probably become my new go-to place when I'm craving a chicken sandwich.