Chauhan Ale & Masala House
Maneet Chauhan's Indian Kitchen Meets Nashville Table
Maneet Chauhan's Midtown room is the Nashville Indian anchor the city actually talks about. The menu runs Indian-American hybrids: Butter Chicken Poutine, Tandoori Fried Chicken, Masala Mac and Cheese. The vegetarian selection is strong enough that plant-based diners eat well without compromise. Pani puri and shrimp kababs show up as standouts alongside the chai masala. Full bar, walk-in friendly, and lively enough for a birthday dinner or a group that just wants to eat something unusual.
Maneet Chauhan opened Chauhan Ale & Masala House in 2014, and the room has held its position as Nashville's most considered Indian restaurant through the full run of the It-City boom. The thesis is straightforward: Indian cooking as a framework for Nashville's hybrid appetite, not a museum piece and not a novelty act. The menu earns that position dish by dish.
The Butter Chicken Poutine is the room's signature collision, gravy-soaked fries carrying the weight of a north Indian braise, and it works because the butter chicken itself is sound. The Tandoori Fried Chicken takes the tandoor's char logic and runs it through a format Nashville already understands. That is not a gimmick; it is a chef making an argument about two traditions that share a commitment to seasoned heat and crunch. The Masala Mac and Cheese occupies the same category, a familiar architecture rebuilt in a spice register the city was not used to in 2014 and has since come to expect here.
Beyond the crossover signatures, the kitchen runs a full Indian program. The pani poori is executed with care, the chai masala arrives properly hot, and the shrimp kababs come through the kitchen fresh and seasoned. Vegetarian options carry real weight on the menu, not an afterthought column. The room turns at full-service pace on weekend evenings; a 7 p.m. reservation is the way to control the experience rather than wait for a table.
Moderately priced for what Nashville charges for dinner in 2024, Chauhan sits in the neighborhood between casual and special-occasion without committing to either. It is the room for a group that wants something more directed than a standard curry house and more grounded than the new-American tasting circuit. The beer program supports the spice register without demanding it.
Insider tip
The Tandoori Fried Chicken is the order that explains the room's logic in one plate. For groups with a vegetarian, the kitchen's non-meat bench is deep enough that no one is eating around the menu.
What to order
Butter Chicken Poutine, Tandoori Fried Chicken, Masala Mac and Cheese
Nashville, TN 37203
© OpenStreetMapMore about the dishes
Fries, cheese curds, and butter chicken gravy in a format that signals exactly what this kitchen does: Indian technique reframed through something familiar.
Tandoori spicing applied to fried chicken, the room's argument that two traditions can occupy the same plate without apology.
Mac and cheese built on masala, the kind of dish that earns its place on a menu by being harder to execute than it sounds.
