5 Masala facts about Indian Restaurants in US

After my graduation, my job search took me to a lot of cities in the US in a short span of time. I ended up eating at a lot of Indian restaurants in the cities I was staying in. Although, I enjoy all cuisines very much, I eat a lot of Indian food because well, I’m Indian.

Last year someone asked me…“Which is the best Indian restaurant you have ever been to in the US?”. As I went through a list of favorite Indian places I had been to, trying to recollect the name of a particular restaurant, I ended up something like this…

Most of us who eat at Indian places will agree Indian restaurant names can be quite repetitive. I decided to take a deeper dive into this topic and I pulled out data on 6500 Indian Restaurants from the Top 200 cities in the US. And if you’re wondering, “What’s in an Indian Restaurant’s name?”, here’s what I found out…

1) 75% of Indian Restaurant names can be constructed from the below ‘keywords’

Indian parents go through lengthy compilations of complicated baby-names when it comes to naming their new-born. Similarly, I’m starting to think, there might be a very popular book of Indian restaurant names in circulation out there; one that has only these 10 magic words: (apart from ‘India’, ‘Indian’ and ‘Restaurant’)

‘Taj’, ‘Tandoori’, ‘Saffron, ‘Cafe’, ‘Bombay’, ’Masala’, ‘Palace’, ‘Spice’, ‘Chaat’ and of course ‘Curry’!

2) There is a ‘Taste of India’ in almost every major city in the US

45 cities in US have an Indian Restaurant named ‘Taste of India’. In fact, Portland, OR has a Taste of India, a New Taste of India and a Real Taste of India. If you visit a lot of cities and love Indian food, you’re going to have a hard time remembering names eventually.

Here are the top 20 most used Indian Restaurant names out there..

Top 20 most used Indian Restaurant Names

3) There are more than 800 Indian Restaurants in Greater NYC alone

Greater NYC comprising of New York, Brooklyn, Bronx, Jackson Heights etc has the highest concentration of Indian Restaurants in the entire US. It is followed by metropolitan areas of San Francisco, Los Angeles and Chicago. The chart below breaks down data on a city level.

4) NY, NJ, CA and TX alone make up for more than 50% of Indian Restaurants in the US

Keep these states on your radar if you love Indian food.

Top 15 States based on number of Indian Restaurants

5) There is actually a ‘secret formula’ to generate Indian Restaurant Names

Presenting the ultimate ‘Indian Restaurant Name Generator’. Place a cross anywhere in this grid and chances are you will find yourself an Indian Restaurant name. So go on, Google those combinations and comment if you actually found something that isn't really out there.

Indian Restaurant Name Generator

With that said, it really doesn't matter what the name of a restaurant is. Don’t we just only care about how good the Butter Chicken or the Mutton Biryani is!

Also, a shout out to those 25% adventurous restaurateurs out there for pushing the envelope when it comes to naming their restaurants.

P.S. This convoluted approach did help me remember the name of the Indian eatery my friend asked me about.

I hope you will remember this article next time you visit an Indian Restaurant and start noticing the names. If you enjoyed the analysis, it would mean a lot to me if you scrolled a little further and hit the Recommend button or share the page on Facebook or Twitter.

Thanks to my wife for the help with editing and her patience. Thanks to Johnny for help with the scraper. ‘Indian’ here includes Indian, Pakistani, Bangladesh and similar cuisines. Data source: Yahoo Local.