Who created the viral TikTok chicken salad? Cleveland deli trends online following Lizzo’s publicity

TikTok, the platform where trends, challenges, and food items go viral, is currently flooded with videos of a chicken salad that has netizens salivating.

If you're a TikTok user, you've almost certainly seen the "It's a chicken salad" sold at Cleveland's 81st Street Deli.

The first TikTok video about the salad received millions of views, instantly making the Deli famous. It all started when a woman shared a TikTok video raving about an unbelievably amazing chicken salad. In the video, she says:

“You have to come up here and get one of these.”

Video goes viral after woman uploads a video talking about a chicken salad in Cleveland, Ohio. (Image via TikTok)

She tells the man filming her that she was eating chicken salad and gives him the name of the deli she got it from.

Singer Lizzo too helped boost the Deli's profile by posting a TikTok in which she munched on what appeared to be a waffle sandwich. As soon as word got out that Lizzo had used the 81st Deli's music in the video, the business at the restaurant exploded.

Lizzo used the Deli's audio, that garnered it more popularity for its chicken salad.

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Chicken, cheese, tomatoes - What else is added in the TikTok viral chicken salad?

Cleveland, Ohio, and the surrounding areas have seen an increase in visitors after a video promoting the city's deli chicken salad went viral on the internet. The women in the video also describes the salad's ingredients, saying:

"I got chicken, pickles, banana peppers, bell peppers, tomatoes, onions …."

The restaurant owner, Wael Herbwai, later told a media outlet that the Deli also adds a spring mix of lettuce, kale, cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, green peppers, mozzarella, cheddar, croutons, jalapenos, and more.

While the post was uploaded on August 28, it went viral around mid-October. Since then, the video has received close to 20 million views.

Wael Herbwai, the Deli's proprietor, claimed that before the video, he sold roughly 30 salads per day, but now sells almost 980 salads each day after the video went viral.

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Cleveland's 81st Street Deli is seeing record-breaking orders as a result of a TikTok video

After Tenisha Godfrey's TikTok video boosted the Deli's sales to new heights, the owner and staff of the Deli shot a slew of videos of people flocking to the restaurant to try the viral salad.

Godrey has been coming to the Deli since she was 14 years old and claims to know Herbawi, the Deli's owner.

In an interview with Yahoo, Tenisha revealed that she did not expect the video to go popular, saying:

"I had got off work. Because it was hot, I was like, I don't want anything heavy. So I stopped at the store like I normally do. And I was like, 'Hey, you guys make salad now, right? And Herbawi was like, 'Yes.' So I was like, 'Can I get a salad?' and I gave him the extra things to put in. And once he was done, it was a beautiful salad. So he said, 'Hey, let's make a TikTok.' And that's where it started."

At the same time, Lizzo's video drew a lot of attention to the Deli, reaching nearly 2 million views in just a few days.