A year later, Curry Island still lives up to the hype

When Curry Island Indian Kitchen opened in Fernandina Beach in October of 2025, people lost their minds a little bit. This was the first standalone Indian restaurant on Amelia Island, and apparently we had all been waiting for one without realizing just how badly. I remember driving by during those first few weeks and seeing every table and chair inside filled, then more people outside waiting to get in. Next door, people heading into Club 14 were walking past what must have been a wall of grilled meat, garlic and spices pouring out of the restaurant. Fernandina had Indian food now, and everybody wanted some.

At the time, I wasn't writing restaurant reviews anymore, so I never got the chance to properly talk about Curry Island. I did, however, eventually make it inside. It was also my first real experience eating at an Indian restaurant. No pressure. I knew some of the vocabulary. Curry. Tikka masala. Naan. I’d eaten Indian food before in one form or another, but sitting down in an actual Indian restaurant and looking over a menu full of things I’d never tried was new territory for me. Fortunately, Curry Island made a very good first impression. Nearly a year later, I wanted to know whether that impression had survived.

Curry Island sits at 1120 S. 14th Street, in the former home of Big Al's Chicken Shack. Big Al's was exactly the sort of place its name suggested: fried chicken, chicken gizzards and other Southern staples. I always meant to try it and never did. Now the same building is home to a tandoor. Restaurant real estate has a strange sense of humor.

From the outside, Curry Island still looks like a restaurant tucked into a small strip mall along 14th Street. Walk through the door, though, and it feels surprisingly removed from everything around it. The front windows cut down the harsh Florida sunlight, leaving the dining room dim and cozy. Soft music plays in the background. One wall is painted a beautiful blue, another has more ornate detailing, chandeliers hang overhead, and a handsome bar sits toward the back of the room. It’s calm in there. You can walk in from 14th Street, sit down, and briefly forget about the traffic, parking lot and everything else happening outside. I liked the interior much more than I expected to.

That atmosphere also helps if, like me, you're still figuring out Indian food. The staff has always been welcoming and more than willing to explain dishes or answer questions. Water gets refilled, somebody checks on you, and you never get the feeling that you’re expected to already know the menu. On my first visit, that menu arrived on an iPad. I’m still not entirely convinced restaurants need to hand me electronics before feeding me. There is something about being handed a communal tablet that makes me immediately aware of fingerprints in a way a laminated menu somehow does not, even though logically I understand that the laminated menu has probably experienced horrors beyond human comprehension. The Curry Island menu app also crashed on me several times and deposited me onto a completely ordinary iPad home screen. Nothing captures the collision between thousands of years of culinary tradition and modern dining quite like trying to order tandoori chicken while waiting for an app to relaunch.

To their credit, it was hardly a crisis. Tap the app again and you’re back. Curry Island's menu is expansive, with vegetarian dishes, curries, tandoori specialties, rice dishes, seafood, paneer, and enough different naan varieties to make ordering bread feel like a major life decision. The restaurant currently lists tandoori chicken at $18 and cheese-and-garlic naan at $7. Those are the two things I came back for.

The tandoori chicken arrived almost glowing, bright red and orange from the marinade, with onions underneath and darker charred edges from the tandoor. The chicken had smoke and char without tasting burnt. The yogurt marinade kept it juicy, while the spices were aromatic and distinct without simply trying to set my mouth on fire. You can certainly find heat at Curry Island if that's what you want, but this wasn't really about heat. It was smoky, savory, fragrant and slightly tangy. The portion wasn't enormous, and I didn't leave carrying enough leftovers to provide tomorrow's dinner, but I also didn't leave hungry. There is a difference between giving you an absurd amount of food and simply giving you enough good food. I'll take the latter.

Then there’s the cheese and garlic naan. The naan is soft and pillowy through the middle, blistered and crisp in spots, buttery, aggressively garlicky and filled with cheese. Curry Island currently charges $7 for it, and I would happily order it again without an entree. You’re not kissing anyone after eating it, and that’s a price I’m willing to pay.

What impressed me most about returning to Curry Island, though, wasn't discovering something new. It was discovering that almost nothing had changed. The tandoori chicken was every bit as good as I remembered it, possibly better. The naan was still excellent. The service was still warm and attentive. The restaurant itself felt clean, comfortable and confident. A year ago, Curry Island had novelty on its side. It was new, it was different, and it was the first dedicated Indian restaurant on Amelia Island. People were going to show up simply because they’d been waiting for something like it. Nearly a year later, novelty no longer gets to do the work. The restaurant does.

They also run lunch from 11 a.m. to 2:15 p.m. and have been promoting a lower-priced lunch option for people who want to try it without committing to a roughly $20 dinner. I haven't personally tried the lunch special yet, so I can't tell you whether it's the best thing on the menu, but I do think it's probably the easiest entry point for somebody who's curious.

If you do go for dinner, I like arriving just ahead of the crowd. There’s something enjoyable about getting a table while the room is still quiet, sitting underneath the chandeliers with the music playing softly, and watching the restaurant gradually fill around you. It happens quickly, which, nearly a year after those first lines stretched outside the door, probably tells you something.

Curry Island Indian Kitchen is, without question, the best Indian restaurant on Amelia Island. Admittedly, it’s competing in a field of one. Still counts. More importantly, it actually deserves the title. Curry Island could have coasted for a while on being the new thing. Instead, almost a year later, the quality has held up, the crowds are still coming, and I’m still thinking about that garlic naan.

A year ago, Curry Island had hype. Now it has something considerably harder to manufacture: consistency.