Indian Cuisine - Desserts

Desserts

Many Indian sweets, or mithai, are fried foods made with sugar, milk or condensed milk. Ingredients vary by region. In the eastern part of India, for example, most sweets are based on milk products. See sections or articles on specific regional cuisines for their preferred types of sweets.

Some common Indian sweets and desserts include:

• Barfi: A sweet made of dried milk with ground cashews or pistachios, often served with a thin layer of edible silver foil as decoration.
• Chikki: A sweet made out of peanuts and molasses.
• Gulab jamun: A dessert consisting of fried milk balls soaked in sweet syrup, such as rose syrup or honey.
• Jalebi: Dough fried in a coil shape dipped in sugar syrup, often taken with milk, tea, yogurt, or lassi.
• Kulfi: An Indian ice cream in a variety of flavors such as mango, saffron, or cardamom.
• Kheer: A sweet rice pudding, usually made with rice and milk
• Malpoa: A type of pancake, made of wheat or rice flour, deep fried and dipped in sugar syrup.
• Rasgulla: A popular sweetmeat, produced by boiling small balls of casein in sugar syrup.
• Sandesh: A sweet made from cheese, kneaded with fine ground sugar and molasses.
• Shrikhand: A creamy dessert made out of strained yogurt, often served with dried fruits such as mangoes.
• Kaju Katli: Similar to barfi, mainly comprises cashew powder along with ghee, cardamom powder and sugar.
• Rabri: Rabri is a sweet, condensed milk based dish made by boiling the milk on low heat for a long time until it becomes dense and changes its color to pinkish. Sugar, spices and nuts are added for flavor. It is chilled and served as dessert.

• Payas (kheer in Hindi)

• Rasmalai, a sweet dish made from cottage cheese

• Imarti, a popular sweet made from lentils

• Rasgulla, a popular sweet dish made from cottage cheese

• Kaju Katli, a popular Indian dessert

• Shrikhand with crushed almonds, saffron and cardamom.