On a colourful candy rush

CHENNAI: During the Chithirai festival season, Madurai-based 65-year-old Meenakshi Sundaram and his 60-year-old wife Thaalai Pushpam are busy creating colourful candies made of jaggery, sugar and a tinge of added colours which are called javmittai. These traditional confectionaries are a crowd favourite during festival days. 

Sundaram has been selling these candies for more than 40 years. “Generation after generation, our family has been into this small-scale business of making candies during festivals. I learned the recipe from my mother when I was a teenager. We also make these candies on occasions like Theppa Thiruvizha, Ashtami Chapram and Vaikunda Ekadesi,” he says. 

They make around 15,000 candies per day and supply them to at least 10 street sellers of Masi Street during this time. They also provide a small wooden stand to these sellers on which the candies are displayed with a tiny kerosene lamp. “We supply it to a limited number of sellers who buy the products from us regularly. We don’t take too many orders or associate with too many sellers since these are all handmade candies and take quite some time to prepare. Though my sons and daughters help us whenever they find the time, a bulk of the work is done by us. When we began the business in 1970s, we used to sell a piece at 1 paise. Today, we sell it for `1. Fifty per cent of the profit made by the seller is shared with us on a daily basis,” he says. 

These delectable candies are made by melting jaggery and sugar together until they attain a texture that is referred to as noolpadham. After this, it is allowed to cool for some time. The mixture is then placed over a metal hook on the wall and is stretched up and down. It is then moulded into irregular round or oval-shaped candies and allowed to dry. The process of stretching is what makes it look like candy. To make them colourful, food colours like red and pink are added during the melting process. They also add dried ginger in some batches.

They make their first batch of candies from 4.30 am till noon. They start their second batch in the evening. “The taste of candies depends on their final texture. To attain this, the candies need to dry properly. Wind helps them to dry completely. That is why we make them in mornings and evenings,” says Thaalai Pushpam. 

The number of javmittai makers in Madurai has gone down in the past decade. “Madurai was once home to several cottage industries that made handmade items and eatables of various kinds. With urbanisation, many of them have vanished. We are among the three or four javmittai makers left in the city now. We will continue to make them since it is profitable till now,” share the couple.
On usual days, Sundaram can be spotted in his shop located near the Nadar Vidhyalaya School, South Gate. There he sells a popular variant of the javmittai that is made only using sugar. They are stretchy when dried and can be shaped into eatable watches, animals or necklaces which fascinate school kids.