We’ve noticed a trend lately that more halal carts are serving Indian food instead of Middle Eastern fare. The vast majority of halal carts still have Middle Eastern menus with chicken or “lamb” over rice, with white and hot sauce. A few have green sauce too, which is herby and spicy.
There have always been Indian carts, most notably Biryani Cart, but there is also My Biryani, the Famous Dal Wagon, etc. These vendors do not look like, or hold themselves out to be halal carts.
Over the past month, we’ve written a few times about Tariq’s #1 Halal Food. it looks like any other halal cart, but the menu has biryani, chicken tikka, shrimp and fish (photo above).
Yesterday we were on 6th Ave and noticed a cart inside the SE corner with more people than usual around it. It looked like every other halal cart around, but the sign said Tasty Halal Food on the side, and on the front menu it said Indian Tasty Halal Food.
At the top of the menu (photo below) were chicken and veggie biryani, chapli, chicken tikka masala, 8 kinds of kati rolls and 3 seafood dishes. You won’t find any of those at the overwhelming majority of Middle Eastern halal carts. Yes, there was chicken or lamb over rice, but it seemed to be more of an afterthought.
Have you noticed this trend too? If so, let us know where some of the other Indian halal carts are. We would like to try them, and we will definitely be going to the Indian Tasty Halal Food cart very soon.
