Candyland

This is funny because it's true. I love kheer (rice pudding) and generally have a high tolerance for Indian desserts, but there's some large swathes of candy-like stuff I just don't get. Little orange piles of noodley things? Squares of um...something? With silver leaf on them (admittedly cool.)

Obama Returns From India With These Gross Candies For Everyone

WASHINGTON—President Barack Obama returned from a recent diplomatic visit to India with several boxes of these disgusting candies that taste, smell, and look really weird, grossed-out White House sources reported Monday. "I feel bad for not wanting to eat them, but they're just awful," said White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, adding that Obama set the candies out in a common area and frequently checked to determine if anyone was eating the disgusting things. "They make me want to puke. One is like this log of sour paste surrounded by some kind of seeds, and another is really hard but tastes like soap. I think these jellied things might be aloe-flavored." Gibbs also confirmed that Obama's attempt to prepare aloo gobhi, an Indian dish consisting of cauliflower and potatoes sautéed in garam masala, stunk up the entire White House.

On a related holiday note, good garam masala (from the Indian store) is an incredible way to pep up traditional sweets such as pumpkin pie, gingersnaps, gingerbread, and the like. Not one that's heavy on the cumin, obviously, but many adapt to a sweet flavor profile beautifully and will have people asking why the gingerbread is so good. Usually the answer to all such dessert-related questions is "there's an incredibl amount of unsalted butter in there," so it's nice to be able to say "it's garam masala" for a change.

Comments

[Cosma Shalizi]

Little orange piles of noodley things?

How can anyone not like jalebi?!?

But the thing about garam masala in desserts is very true. My mother also used to put it in bolognese sauce, though she tweaked the spice mixture for that in a way I don't recall.

[[email protected]]

Meh. I'm in India, and I have a long list of people who I know are more than happy to get the boxes of sweets I'm bringing them b/c they eat them up when other people bring to us. Many of them are not even brown. I pretty much expressed my feelings on this genre over here.

I love Jalebi, but it is very sweet, and I can no longer eat gobs and gobs of it.

[ben w]

Actually, the usual answer to why anything is so good is usually the incredible amount of butter.

This looks pretty incredible.

[Gene O'Grady]

Only partly related, but the first time the 49ers won the Super Bowl my wife was working in a now dead company (Syntex, if anyone knows it) with a lot of Indian colleagues. One Indian couple decided to host a Super Bowl party complete with Indian buffet (including chicked dishes that they wouldn't have eaten themselves). Best multicultural experience ever.

[christine]

i'm imagining jalebis soaked in some warm milk..think i'm goin' for a recipe right now!