Ankeny Noodle Zoo Cafe and Catering

Great food!!! The sun dried chicken grill sandwich is very good as is their house salad. The Parmesan grills are also great. They offer a great menu and all of it is fantastic!

My boyfriend and I are obsessed. Great quality and just so. dang. good! The salad, the bob, the atmosphere, everything is fantastic. I am a picky eater yet I still plan on trying something new here! A++

Stopped by here for lunch with my toddler and wasn’t sure what to expect as we had never been, but had always heard people talk positively about it. All I can say is wow! The woman who helped us was so nice and gave suggestions when we were trying to decide what to order. We decided to share the Kim’s Special (pasta), sundried tomato pesto cream sauce over penne pasta with Parmesan crusted chicken (10.95). It came with soup or salad (we got Caesar salad) and bread. We sat on the patio and our food was ready within 10 minutes. The pasta was absolutely delicious and the Caesar salad and bread were great too! My son also ate a ton of the pasta and loved it, which was a plus since he’s such a picky eater. I’m so glad we stopped here– we almost didn’t. The food and the service were way beyond what I expected, and needless to say we will be returning customers.

Our favorite place for our bi-​annual ladies day. Noodle Zoo has a great menu. I have not had a bad meal. They are family owned and run. The service is as good as the food. Especially like their mediterranean sandwiches. The soups are usually to heavy for my taste but everyone else seems to like them.
Ankeny is a wonderful town for families. Visiting son n his family.

Love the modern artistic look of the restaurant and patio.
Go for the bruschetta! $ 4.95 for a huge loaded plate with kalamata olives and feta cheese!!! Such an amazing deal and one of the best I have ever had! Which says a lot because I am a bit of a bruschetta addict!
The Kim’s special pasta with Parmesan crusted chicken and sun dried tomato cream sauce was delicious and super rich and creamy!!!
The linguini with spinach and tomatoes was super delicious as well. It had a nice light butter sauce. Which everything is better with butter!
The pastas come with soup or salad. And toasted cheesy bread which is to die for!
Staff is super friendly and it is super clean!
This is one of the best soup/​salad/​pasta places I have been! I cannot wait to return!!!

Pro: Very good food, friendly wait staff and pleasant atmosphere. Be prepared for left overs or at the very least you won’t leave hungry.
Con: They could use a little more wait staff during the rush periods.

Always wanted to eat here but kept putting it on hold because it was further away than the other establishments in the area, that’s just me being lazy haha. Well I got unlazy and decided to try it out finally!
I went during the lunch rush so that was a learning experience, apparently all the employees of neighboring offices enjoy eating lunch here. The line was nearly out the door. You grab a menu when you stand in line to order at the counter so you know what to order when you get to the counter. The overall wait in line was not bad, it moved along relatively quick.
The staff was very friendly and helpful. I ordered the herb crusted chicken and the staff member asked me if I had it before, I said no and then she asked if I liked cilantro, I love cilantro so I said yes, then she said okay. I guess people in the past have complained about the strong cilantro taste it comes with haha. I got the house Salad as the side it comes with. My friend ordered the pasta primavera with the beer cheese soup as a side. We both got their bread as a side that it comes with as well. These items came with these sides because they were included with the «pasta bowl» items.
My herb crusted chicken pasta bowl was delicious! I loved the cilantro flavor, to me it wasn’t overpowering at all, but I could eat cilantro by the handful. The salad was fresh and flavorful. The soup was very good, super flavorful and the texture was amazing! The bread was delicious as well! The pasta primavera… eh…I didn’t like it… it’s not for me.
Overall fantastic experience, looking forward to eating here again!

I am truly surprised this place received such high reviews. I am typically easy to please when it comes to food. I could not believe the extremely low quality of the food here. The beer cheese soup and focaccia bread were probably the worst I have ever had. My 3 year old and 1 year old refused to eat the Mac and cheese… that never happens. The outdoor area was very nice and I really wish I would of had a better dining experience because I would love to revisit this place.

I am truly surprised this place received such high reviews. I am typically easy to please when it comes to food. I could not believe the extremely low quality of the food here. The beer cheese soup and focaccia bread were probably the worst I have ever had. My 3 year old and 1 year old refused to each the Mac and cheese… that never happens. The outdoor area was very nice and I really wish I would of had a better dining experience because I would love to revisit this place.

If I could give this place a zero for dinner, I would. But I’ll give it a 2 because of the food, which was tasty. The service was atrocious from the minute we walked in the door. We were pointed to our seat without being handed menus. The patio was seated but for some reason was locked. Three simple dishes took a half an hour, with only four other tables occupied. People near us waited 20 minutes for drinks. The waitress walked off with my wife’s water glass to refill it during our meal, and did not return it for 5 minutes or more. We had to get up to get our check and pay our bill. Never once did we receive an apology. My first and last trip.

Went to check out this place yesterday because I was waiting for my boyfriend while he had an appointment nearby.
Since I came in when it just opened (about 10-​ish am), I was the first. I was unsure if I was supposed to sit myself and wait for a waitress or if someone was going to sit me so I just stood there for 5 minutes (the owner was on the phone) before deciding I would just sit myself.
Later when the owner was done talking on the phone, she came over and explained to me that they took orders in the front. She and the staff were very nice.
The food was really good. My boyfriend and I split the Greek Chicken Sandwich and got the mushroom soup for the side. It was so good that we decided to order another one after we got done with the first one. We got the salad the second time round. The soup and salad both were average.
I would definitely eat here again.

We had always thought NZ looked like a cool place and my husband an I were excited to go in and try it finally. Unfortunately we were extremely disappointed. No one greeted us when we walked in. The place was empty save a table or two with a server sweeping the floor and some staff standing idly behind the counter. We surmised that we were to seat ourselves and grabbed filthy, tattered, gross looking menus. Unsure of what system they had going as far as how to order (was the server cleaning the floor going to stop by, or did we go up to the counter) we sat there feeling utterly confused and unwelcome. Ultimately we got up and left. Needless to say, we won’t be going back.

We had purchased a LivingSocial deal for Noodle Zoo not realizing that it was only for the Ankeny location (we live and work on the west side of town). It took us a while to make it up to Ankeny but we finally did. This Noodle Zoo looks much like the one in West Des Moines except that it is larger inside and outside (the patio). The menu also seemed to be the same.
I ordered the same as I always have, the Pasta Primavera with Sun-​dried Chicken. It comes with a salad (might be my favorite part of the meal) and garlic bread (also delicious). My fiancé ordered the Herb Crusted Chicken to shake things up a bit. He also ordered Beer Cheese Soup. We finished with two cupcakes, red velvet and vanilla bean. I am always surprised at how much food we get! My dish tasted as expected but seemed to have a lot more sauce than normal. It seemed to be drowning. The salad and bread was as good as always. The Beer Cheese soup was sooo good! The Herb Crusted Chicken was not our cup of tea. It had too much of a cilantro taste for us. The cupcakes were yummy! I had their Pomegranate Blueberry Tea and very much enjoyed that as well.
I would have given them 5 stars but the Herb Crusted Chicken just was not for us. If you love cilantro, go for it! But honestly, give this place a try!

The restaurant is walking distance from my house and I love sitting on the outdoor patio (the newly painted mural is amazing) to enjoy the «Kim Special.» It’s not on the menu, but all the wait staff know what it is.
Portions are almost too generous, but the leftover noodle bowls make a great lunch the following day!

This place is fantastic. Very classy and the food is great. Great wait staff. I only wish they had a few more pasta choices.

I just visited Noodle Zoo for lunch with my wife and in-​laws, and I have to say I was thoroughly impressed. The ambiance was nice, the food was excellent, and the prices were fantastic. Considering how large the portions were and the fresh ingredients, I would have expected to pay quite a bit more than I did.
The bread they serve is quite good, as is the standard Caesar side salad.
The owner is a very nice woman who is very attentive, and the rest of the staff follows her example.
It is true that the menu is limited — the place is called «Noodle Zoo,» yet there are only 5 noodle dishes on the menu. The majority of the menu is soup, sandwiches, and salads.
For a healthy meal made from fresh ingredients at a very fair price, I highly recommend them.

The Noodle Zoo on the north end of Ankeny fits right alongside it’s other local sibling locations. The dining room has hand painted, jungle-​themed floors with a myriad of colors and artwork splashed around the walls. Seating is handled via simple, yet elegant, round or square tables and wooden chairs.
The menu is slightly sparse in comparison to other restaurants (just a one-​panel menu, front side only), but they offer a wide variety in what they do serve. I always get the Parmesan grill sandwich, choosing ham, turkey or chicken depending on how I’m feeling.
All entrees come with a unique noodle house salad with ranch dressing and croutons, sure to set your meal off to a great start. Beverages are served in real glass glasses, something that seems to be rather rare these days. I usually enjoy a Diet Coke with my meal (served by the can with an ice-​filled glass), though they’ve also got a bar and a nice selection of wines, alcohol and other beers and microbrews.
If you can’t make it into the dining room, consider ordering a slew of Zoo Bags for your next office meeting. This fresh take on deli favorites is sure to be a hit.