chhena sweets evolved to chenna toast with a layer of cream on top to resemble buttered toast egg sandesh which was made to look like a scotch egg and jalbhara sandesh which was an imitation of european liqueur chocolates there has been another revival in the last 15 years a new generation of sweetmakers have gone abroad to culinary schools and introduced the next round of innovations she says for instance kolkatas balaram mullick sweets started the baked rosogolla gur souffle and makha sandesh cakeone of the chefs to first experiment with traditional sweets was manish mehrotra of indian accent who created desserts such as warm doda burfi treacle tart and vanilla ice cream and badam halwa pie with cranberries and chinni malai ice cream but the gourmet mithaiwalas are a more recent phenomenonlast year le cordon bleutrained chef and restaurateur rachel goenkas book titled adventures with mithai featured 50 recipes inspired by sweets from around the country including mohan bhog cream eclairs and amrakhand mousse with besan laddoo towers mithai is associated with indian celebrations but i wanted to convert them into contemporary desserts says goenka who developed the recipes over seven yearsthe mithai bug has bitten even a luxury hotel like roseate which started an outlet in its delhi property in 2019 we hope to do for mithai what macrons have done for the french dessert industry says executive director ankur bhatia last year even the bikanerwala group roped in paristrained pastry chef sahil mehta to create a new line of fusion mithai desserts for their new delhibased gourmet brand saugaat including a coconut laddoo filled with sour passion fruit gel and khoya barfi infused with lemongrassmost gourmet mithais come at a price tag of around rs 100150 per piece and are often ordered for celebrity weddings and functions delhibased gur chini supplied 800 boxes of its famous pista and gold varq laddoo priced at rs 1000 a piece to akash ambanis wedding while gurugrams berfila claims their chana barfi with chocolate is a favourite with anushka sharmadespite the premium pricing these experiments seem to be hitting the sweet spot