Portuguese Grill Tio Pepe Chicken Heads to the Linc

Tio Pepe Chicken, a Portuguese-style grill, is coming to the Linc development in North Austin this September. Located at 6406 North I-35, the restaurant focuses on chicken served with peri-peri sauce.

Owner Pepe Garcia shared that the menu, which is still in flux, will feature chicken (by the quarter, half, or whole) with six options of spicy peri-peri sauce, which is a condiment made of chilies, citrus peel, onion, garlic, and, lemon juice. It will be available in extra hot, hot, medium, lemon-herb, garlic (Garcia’s favorite), and mild. Elsewhere on the menu, there are sides like wings, cilantro rice, steamed vegetables, and Portuguese desserts.

Garcia is the third generation in his family to open a restaurant — both his grandfather and his mother operate restaurants, and Juan in a Million is operated by his relative. He fell in love with peri-peri sauce while traveling through Portugal.

“My family and friends always mention that I am a great host and good cook,” Garcia told Eater, “and encouraged me to open my own restaurant.” After a bit of market research, he believed that Austinites are in need of healthy fast-casual options and open to trying new local restaurants, so he decided to bring peri-peri to the city.

Rotisserie chicken is the hot new thing in Austin. Out in Oak Hill is Winner Winner Rotisserie and Fine Foods, a rotisserie meats restaurant found in a refurbished railroad dining car. Then there’s chicken pop-up Austin Rotisserie, currently holed up at Infinite Monkey Theorem.

The Linc, the Highland Mall redevelopment, already includes the Austin Film Society movie theater, Peruvian restaurant Lima Criolla, and Tex-Mex restaurant Vivo. Bakery and beer garden Easy Tiger is still working on that long-awaited expansion to the development.

This article was changed to reflect that Tio Pepe is a grill, not a rotisserie.

• Tio Pepe Chicken [Official]
• Tio Pepe Chicken [Instagram]