Kolkata sweet shops offer fusion of traditional Bengali and western items

Fusion is the key-word in sweets across Kolkata sweet shops this New Year`s. Anything, from tarts to mousse, from pies to muffins, from rich plum cakes to baked and caramelised yoghurt, the city’s best-known mishti brands have gone all out to fuse western traditions with indigenous Bengali sweet making techniques and have churned out Christmas and New Year specials.

Sweet sellers say business is rocking and they are back to last year’s sale figures in most stores. Even till the beginning of winter, sweet sellers say, they were heavily depending on food aggregators who collect online orders from their stores. But the counter sales across all outlets have soared in this festive season.

The rise in sales is applicable for not only top city brands like Balaram Mullick, Banchharam, Sen Mahasay, Mithai, Ganguram, Mouchak, Nakur and KC Das but also for some of the big brands in the districts like Felu Modak of Rishra, a 143-year-old shop that continued making Bandel cheese and Danish cheese cakes.

“The Danes actually used our chhanar cake making techniques to churn out their cheese cakes. We have made these cakes in varying weights from 100 grams to one kilogram and they are selling like the proverbial hot cakes,” said Amitabha Dey Modak of the shop, Felu Modak. He added that his business is back to last year’s pace. Banchharam has 18 stores and at least 10 of them are doing more than 100% business compared to last year. In rest of the stores, the business has picked up by 80-90%. “Gajar halwa mousse, nolen gurer crepes suzette, eggless brownies and gurer rasmalai are our new items for this festive season. We are happy that these items are going off well with the buyers,” said Shubhojit Ghosh of Banchharam.

Mithai is baking Sandesh with a layer of cake that has caught the attention of buyers since it came on to the shelves before Christmas just like two other items, caramel doi and dry-baked chamcham with its distinct smoky flavour. “We are happy that positive sentiments are back and we are nearly where we were at this time last year,” said Nilanjan Ghosh, owner of Mithai.

Cake mixing is done as elaborately as in any bakery of the city in the workshop of Balaram Mullick. Every year, along with plum cake Sandesh, it brings out new Christmas items. This time, new Nolen gurer gateaux, new variants of biscotti, baklava, and kittypies have made their appearance.

“We are back to 90-100% business in most of our 11 stores. The demand for the new sweets is so high in our stores at Ecopark, Bhowanipore and Lake Gardens that we are running out of our stocks several times in a day,” said Sudip Mullick of Balaram Mullick.

Many sweet sellers said that the outlets in north Kolkata have responded well to the idea of fusion sweets this time and alongside personal buying, gifting is also the flavour of the season. “Business in only five of our 18 outlets is slightly down. Our eggless cakes and pastries and Sandesh cake are selling 300% via aggregators and online,” said Rahul Chaurasia, director of Ganguram.