Americans Are Ordering Less Tikka Masala. India Is Still Ordering More Butter Chicken.
A U.S. consumer panel shows tikka masala, saag, and chana slipping. In India, butter chicken is up about 42 percent.
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- butter-chicken
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Chicken tikka masala is still what plenty of Americans order when they do not want to negotiate the rest of the menu. A U.S. consumer panel says interest in it fell about 7 percent over the past year. In India, a separate panel has butter chicken up about 42 percent.
Both figures come from Tastewise, a company that reads restaurant menus and online food conversation, then sells that picture to restaurants and packaged-food brands. The U.S. post is dated July 20, 2026. The India post is dated June 9. They are trade research from two different months.
The laminated menu is the part that slipped
The U.S. declines sit on the dishes a lot of diners learned to point at. Chicken tikka masala, down about 7 percent. Lamb curry, down about 12. Saag paneer, spinach with fresh cheese, down about 16. Chana masala, chickpeas in a tomato gravy, down about 22. Mild, creamy or a little sweet, easy to tear naan into.
Butter chicken belongs to that same comfort set, and the July post talks about people moving on from it. The post never prints a U.S. percentage for butter chicken on its own, so the 7 percent stays with tikka masala. Rich food is still being ordered. Dal makhani, black lentils cooked down with butter, is up about 10 percent in that same panel. Coconut curry is up about 8. The gravy you can request without naming it is the one losing ground.
Biryani, chaat, and filter coffee
Biryani is up about 10 percent, and Tastewise already treats it as a familiar dish with a real audience. Chaat is up about 9 percent. Samosa chaat, the broken pastry with yogurt and chutney, is up about 14. Chicken 65, the deep-red fried chicken tied to Chennai, is up about 17 percent. Parotta, the flaky layered flatbread, is up about 24. Falooda, cold rose milk with noodles and basil seeds, is up about 26. South Indian filter coffee, a strong decoction loosened with hot milk, is up about 54 percent.
A 54 percent rise in filter coffee puts some of the growth in the cup after the main course. Paneer is still up about 7 percent in the U.S. panel and ghee about 6. Kashmiri chili, the mild red pepper cooks reach for when they want color more than burn, is up about 26 percent. Name a place when you order: a Hyderabadi or Kolkata biryani, a chaat you assemble, chicken 65, or filter coffee if the kitchen actually brews it that way.
In India, butter chicken is still spreading
The June India panel is a restaurant story with the cream turned up. Butter chicken is up about 42 percent from a year earlier, and Tastewise scores it as the format restaurants in that dataset should watch first. Ghee used as a last spoon of fat is up about 30 percent. Menus that say creamy are up about 29. Biryani is already the most common format they track. Restaurants there already know how to sell it.
Interest in idli is up about 60 percent, and Tastewise says the restaurant menus in its set still do not list the steamed rice-and-lentil cake. South Indian breakfast is in the conversation. A lot of dinner rooms have not cooked it yet. A Sunday idli is still easier to find at a tiffin counter, or to steam at home, than on a North Indian evening menu.
If your American habit is still tikka masala or saag, the growth in this panel is a biryani with a city on it, a chaat, chicken 65, or filter coffee when the room makes it. Order butter chicken when you want butter chicken. In India, that same dish is still how a lot of newer restaurant traffic shows up, next to a biryani that was already the house plate. For how the creamy chicken became the American shorthand, see Why Non-South Asians Love Butter Chicken. For why so many U.S. menus still read North Indian, see Why North Indian Food Still Owns Most American Menus.