I'll Take You to the Candy Shop

I woke up this morning feeling a little tired and a little stressed out for no reason other than I was a little tired. I hate those days, when you feel yourself slipping into the dark recesses of a bad mood for no reason. Why should I feel down? I haven’t a care in the world, and I’m in India. In The Life of Pi by Yann Martel, I discovered a quote that I have come to appreciate greatly: “A stint in India will beat the restlessness out of any living creature.” I can tell you now from experience that truer words have never been said.

I knew that I had to do something quickly to fix my mood. Off to Gobind Sweet Shop!

Indian sweets are interesting. Nothing is baked, of course, and there are so few raw ingredients from which they are made: sugar, ghee, flour, milk and gram flour are the staples. Flavorings come and go at a whim. As a result, much of it tastes similar, and they all share one quality: overwhelming sweetness over richness. It makes sense for a society that doesn’t get a lot of fat infused in their cuisine. It is, however, somewhat disconcerting after awhile to eat so many desserts that have so little soul, and just sweetness. That’s why I actually don’t eat them too much anymore. Today, however, I knew that a bit (or more) of sweet treats would bring me out of this slump.

There are a lot of sweet shops around here, but I like Gobind because it is definitely one of the cleanest. I prefer gulab jamon and patisa. Gulab jamon are small balls made from flour and milk solids that have been fried and then soaked into sugar syrup. They are usually dark in color due to the caramelization of the sugars in the dough, and are normally flavored with rosewater. Patisa are small squares of flaky gram dough flavored with cardamom. When I said flavored with cardamom, I mean that whole cardamom seeds are put into the dough after it has finished cooking. Which means that as a whole, patisa doesn’t taste like cardamom, until you bite into one of the pods and get a huge overwhelming flavor with it. Otherwise, it’s awesome.

Indians in this area like to eat desserts and sweets before meals, not after. Your mother always probably told you not to have a cookie before dinner because it would ruin your appetite. That’s actually the point in Indian cuisine. If you eat sweets before the meal, you won’t eat as much during the main course. Is this a healthier way to eat? Maybe, but if I went to an Indian wedding, I would just stuff myself with sweets before the food was actually served. I know that’s not healthy.

The good news is that as soon as I bit down on a syrupy gulab jamon, I immediately felt better. The bad news is that I know it’ll be some time before I crave some more Indian sweets. Oh well. Guess I’ll just have to go make ice cream.