Indian Desserts Are Ready for Their Matcha Moment
While savory cuisine from India is consumed across the world, its desserts haven’t really gone mainstream (yet). Bombay Sweet Shop has a plan to change that.
Mithai is molded into nontraditional shapes before more intricate layers are added at Bombay Sweet Shop’s Mumbai kitchen.
Photographer: Sunil Thakkar for Bloomberg Businessweek
Dubai’s pistachio candy bars flood social media, Japanese matcha rules the world’s puddings and pastries, and London’s chocolate-drenched strawberries return each year as a TikTok obsession. As desserts become increasingly borderless, members of the world’s largest population can’t help but wonder: When will Indian sweets have their global moment?
“You walk out of a duty-free in Switzerland, and you are carrying a Toblerone; we need an Indian confectionery brand that talks about India at that level,” says Yash Bhanage, co-founder and chief operating officer of Mumbai-based Hunger Inc. Hospitality Pvt Ltd., which owns Bombay Sweet Shop, a growing six-year-old dessert brand that envisions introducing Indian desserts to the global Instagram-fueled masses.