Malpua

Malpua is one of the oldest documented sweets of the subcontinent: a sweet fried cake called apupa, made from barley or rice flour and fried in ghee or oil, is referred to in ancient Indian texts, and malpua is generally regarded as a descendant of that early fried-cake tradition. Over time the batter shifted toward wheat flour, milk and khoya, and the dish spread across North and East India, Bengal and Odisha — where it features in temple offerings, including at the Jagannath temple in Puri — as well as into Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan. Its great age means no single inventor exists; it is a living descendant of an ancient pan-Indian sweet.

A small golden-brown disc, frilly and crisp where the edges fried thin, soft and syrup-soaked toward the middle, glistening wet. The first bite is faintly crunchy then yields to a tender, custardy, milk-sweet interior scented with cardamom and saffron; banana or fennel versions add fruity or aniseed notes. Eaten warm, often with a cool spoon of creamy rabri that turns it lush. The contrast of the lacy fried rim against the syrup-heavy centre is the whole pleasure.

The batter is thinned with milk and rested so the flour hydrates and any leavening or natural fermentation lightens it; a little mashed banana, semolina or khoya adds body and helps the edges crisp and brown via the Maillard reaction. Ladled into shallow hot ghee, the batter spreads and the thin perimeter fries crisp while the centre stays soft. As with other syrup sweets, the fried pancakes are dipped into warm — not boiling — sugar syrup, where the porous cooked batter draws sweetness in without dissolving. Keeping the syrup at roughly a one-string consistency stops the discs from going limp.