Roti Grill sits in a strip mall off Preston Road, in one of those stretches of Plano where Indian grocery stores and discount phone shops share parking lots with nail salons. The dining room is plain — maybe thirty seats, fluorescent-adjacent lighting, laminated menus. None of that is a complaint. The food is what pulls you back.
The restaurant specializes in Northern Indian cooking, and the kitchen takes that seriously. The dal makhani — black lentils slow-cooked with butter and cream — is thick and smoky, the kind you want to mop up with a full order of garlic naan rather than just the half they give you. That naan comes out of a tandoor oven, blistered and slightly charred at the edges, and it arrives hot enough to burn your fingers if you’re not careful. Order two.
The chicken tikka masala here is not the watered-down orange sauce that gets passed off at lunch buffets all over the metroplex. It’s deeper in color, spiced without being aggressive, and the chicken actually tastes like it spent time in a marinade before it hit the grill. The saag paneer is similarly grounded — the spinach has real body to it, and the paneer holds its shape rather than dissolving into the sauce.
If you eat meat, the lamb dishes are where Roti Grill separates itself most clearly. The lamb rogan josh is not on every table, but it should be. It’s a Kashmiri-style preparation, slow-braised with whole spices, and the meat pulls apart without resistance. The sauce has an earthy, slightly floral quality from the dried Kashmiri chiles — different from the tomato-forward gravies that dominate the rest of the menu.
Lunch on weekdays runs a buffet, which is worth knowing about if you work nearby. Around eleven-thirty it’s fresh and abundant; by one o’clock, some of the trays are thinner. Dinner is à la carte and generally more reliable for specific dishes. Most entrees land between twelve and eighteen dollars. A full dinner for two with bread and a couple of appetizers — the samosas are sturdy, not greasy — will run you forty to fifty dollars before tip.
Service is efficient and unhurried, depending on how busy the room is. On a Thursday evening, there were maybe eight other tables occupied, and the pacing was relaxed in a way that felt intentional rather than slow. No one rushes you out. The mango lassi arrives in a large glass and is appropriately thick — not a smoothie, not watered down, just mango and yogurt doing what they’re supposed to do.
Plano has a wide range of Indian restaurants, from fast-casual to white-tablecloth, and Roti Grill sits comfortably in the middle of that range without trying to be anything it isn’t. It doesn’t have an online presence that does it justice, and word of mouth among the local South Asian community keeps it steadily occupied. That alone tells you something. Go on a weeknight, order the lamb, and get the naan while it’s still hot.
