Entry for Click - Jalebi: The God of Sweet Things

I’ve made it in the nick of time for Click, the food photography contest hosted by Bee and Jai on Jugalbandi. The theme for this month is NOODLES, but kindly enough it doesn’t restrict it to just the stereotypical Maggi types and lets pastas and chaklis enter the race too.

So keeping with the theme, I’ve picked jalebi - deep-fried concentric noodles oozing of sugar syrup. In the days of mousse and cheesecake, jalebi stands out as quite a plain-jane dessert item. But in the yesteryears jalebi was the king’s delight. Said to have origins in the state of Punjab, jalebi preferably coupled with rabri (thickened milk) and garnished with pistachios, is still a hit at many weddings across the Indian subcontinent.

This picture was taken at a suburban farsan shop that attracts hordes of people at any time of the day for the not-so-staple meal of two samosa-paus with 100 gms jalebi. For Rs. 25 it’s far more filling (and may I add tasty) than a McDonald’s meal. The entry below (taken with a Sony Handycam) is one from the string of pictures that describes the mass-production of jalebis, a process that the shop has mastered over time. I will soon be putting up a short video describing the going-ons in this shop as part of a series on Mumbai street food. But for now do relish my interpretation of the god of sweet things.