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TasteAtlas, a global culinary and travel guide, just announced its coveted list of the top 100 cities in the world for sampling local cuisine. The ranking is based on its significant database, and also includes Google restaurant ratings. Five Indian cities—Mumbai, Hyderabad, New Delhi, Chennai, and Lucknow—ranked 35th, 39th, 56th, 65th, and 92nd on this worldwide culinary hotspot list, respectively. The Indian dishes and eateries listed in TasteAtlas showcased the amazing melting pot of culinary influences in India from the Awadhi kebabs and nihari of Lucknow and Delhi to the common man's working lunch of vada pav in Mumbai.
Out of 16,601 cities in their database, based on 395,205 (271,819 valid) user votes, the 100 cities recorded the best average ratings for regional and national dishes most commonly served in them. You can find more details about the list here.
Taste Atlas is a world atlas that maps traditional dishes, local ingredients, and authentic restaurants around the globe. They have catalogued the best restaurants, food cities, and over 10,000 foods and drinks, and dozens of thousands more are yet to be researched and mapped. The popular ones, as well as the forgotten tastes and aromas of every city, region, and village in the world.
"The million dollar question: Where in the world can you try the best local food?" asked TasteAtlas. "We decided to rummage through our database and combine the findings with restaurant ratings on Google," they said, explaining the process. "What we did was the following: we combined the average of the ratings of the best local and regional dishes served in a particular city, the average rating of the national dishes served in that city, and the average Google rating of the best traditional restaurants in that city."
The website lists each city, along with the foods it is famous for and some popular restaurants to sample local foods. Not everyone may agree with the list and the foods and eateries given under each city. According to the Taste Atlas rankings, Mumbai is famous for Bhelpuri, Pav Bhaji, Vada Pav, Modak, and Panipuri. Among the best authentic restaurants listed were Ram Ashraya, Shree Thaker Bhojanalay, Nawab Saheb, Café Madras, Leopold Cafe, The Bombay Canteen, and Baba Falooda.
Just a few days back, TasteAtlas had ranked masala chai second in the world's top non-alcoholic beverages. Describing the drink, TasteAtlas mentioned that it is made with a combination of sweetened black tea and milk that is spiced with a masala mix—which typically includes cardamom, ground ginger, cloves, cinnamon, and black peppercorns.
The other popular Indian beverage that made it to TasteAtlas rankings is lassi. Variations of Punjab's favourite beverage have secured multiple positions in TasteAtlas. Mango lassi came in first among the world's top 16 dairy beverages for 2023-24. The traditional Punjabi lassi ranks fourth on the list. Sweet lassi is also ranked as the fifth finest dairy beverage in the world. That's three titles devoted to lassis in the top dairy beverages in the world.
In August 2023, TasteAtlas unveiled its collection of the "50 Best Lamb Dishes in the World," in which two Indian creations, rogan josh and galouti kebab, secured the 23rd and 26th positions, respectively.
In June 2023, TasteAtlas named Kochi's famed eatery Paragon as one of the world's most iconic restaurants. It was ranked 11th among the world's 150 most legendary eateries. And their biryani has been declared an iconic dish.
