Roly-Poly, Love Cake & Kul-Kuls: The Wonderful World of Anglo-Indian Sweets
Anglo-Indian sweets are an interesting chimera. There is little doubt that the British influence on Indian food was profound, with new ingredients, cooking techniques, and flavours. However, the fusion was not one-sided. Indian spices, herbs, and culinary techniques were gradually incorporated into British recipes, leading to the creation of a distinctive Anglo-Indian food sub culture.
Leafing through his late grandmother’s dog-eared recipe book of curiously named sweets, Raul Dias gets a rare glimpse into the fascinating world of Anglo-Indian confections, a delicious range of treats that are slowly becoming a thing of the past, as the community diminishes in number.
Growing up, I was always aware that my maternal grandmother’s existence had a protracted sense of duality. As a true blue card-carrying member of the Anglo-Indian community, Nan, as I called her, traversed, both, the Indian, and the western worlds with graceful aplomb. She loved listening to her Doris Day records, as much as she did her Manna Deys. She cut a fashionable figure in both her floral print “frocks” (as she called dresses), and her wispy chiffon and georgette saris as well. Always sporting her blood red Max Factor lipstick, her Chanel No.5 perfume, huge Jackie O-esque black sunglasses shading her piercing grey eyes, and that signature string of pink pearls she wore in two rows, circling her long neck.
The writer’s nan (centre), Gladys Myrtle Harbour.
While she was “Gladdie” aka Gladys Myrtle Harbour to her posse of ladies-who-play-bridge at the Gymkhana in Bandikui, a small railway town in Rajasthan’s Dausa district where she lived, she was the formidable
Mrs Louis Lobo to her Goan railway officer husband’s colleagues. Legend has it that my granddad’s friends would do anything to score an invitation for high tea at the family’s sprawling railway bungalow quarters.
And that’s also something that had a lot to do with the dichotomous life that Nan lived. Now, while she couldn’t cook anything savoury (not even an omelette, that I can vouch for!) to save her life, it was the polar opposite where sweets were concerned. Nan’s Anglo-Indian sweets, cakes and pudding repertoire was astounding in its variety and intricate delicacy. She made them all with a fevered passion. For birthdays, for anniversaries — and the greatest of them, she saved for Christmas and Easter.
Just like Nan, Anglo-Indian sweets are an interesting chimera of sorts. There is little doubt that the British influence on Indian food was profound, introducing new ingredients, cooking techniques, and flavours. However, the fusion was not one-sided. Indian spices, herbs, and culinary techniques were gradually incorporated into British recipes, leading to the creation of a distinctive Anglo-Indian food sub-culture; often, with sweets at the pinnacle of this confluence.
British ‘puds’ as desserts are called affectionately, often featured butter, sugar, and flour. These were adapted by Indian cooks using local ingredients such as jaggery, coconut, and various fruits. The result was the genesis of sweets that combined the rich, decadent qualities of British desserts with the bold, aromatic flavours of Indian cuisine.
It has been just a little over two decades since Nan’s passing in the August of 2002, but the reminiscent taste of her ghee-enhanced, spiced Allahabadi Easter cake, the gossamer lightness of her rose de kokis and the fragrance of her brandy-drenched Christmas pudding still gets me teary-eyed. All this, as I remember the indelible edible legacy she left behind. Recipes, annotated with funny bits of trivia and anecdotes she added, can be found ensconced in the pages of an ancient, dog-eared cookbook. One that’s in the zealous possession of her oldest daughter, my Aunt Margaret.
Roly Poly is a rare Anglo Indian sweet served with a dollop of raspberry jam, and surrounded by a moat of silky vanilla custard. Photo: Raul Dias.
One such Anglo-Indian gem that is as rare to find, as it is absurdly easy to make, is the cutely named roly-poly. Nan notes that this recipe was handed down to her by her father, Samuel Harbour, who was from Kent in the United Kingdom. Originally made by steaming a mixture of suet (a kind of lard-like animal fat taken from the kidneys of cattle), self raising flour, sugar and milk in the sleeve of a discarded shirt, this original British pudding was called ‘shirt-sleeve pudding’ or ‘dead-man’s arm’ in its country of origin. Only years later, taking on the comical name of ‘roly-poly’ when it was served as a nourishing treat to convalescing little Anglo-Indian children. Always with a dollop of raspberry jam anointing it, and surrounded by a moat of silky vanilla custard.
The aforementioned Allahabadi Easter cake was a particularly favourite one in Nan’s repertoire. So deeply loved by all, my mum still gets requests for its recipe from immigrant Anglo-Indian friends and family, settled in places as far off as Canada and Australia. Made popular by scores of Christian bakeries (a few of which still remain, like Bushy Bakery) that once dotted the former Anglo-Indian stronghold Railway junction of Allahabad, it is a light brown spiced fruit cake, with a faint hint of salt on the palate, imparted by the ghee.
This desi ingredient, along with bits of petha (candied ash gourd) used in lieu of candied peel, was used as a substitute for the hard-to-procure packaged butter (a brand called Polson’s, Nan notes, was the best) that was still a luxury for the average middle class Indian in the late 1940s. Anglo-Indian or otherwise!
Interestingly, a similar spiced cake called Love Cake of Bolo de Amor can be found in neighbouring Sri Lanka; a legacy of the Burgher community. They are the Anglo-Indian equivalent in Sri Lanka, of Portuguese-Lankan lineage. Here too, candied peel is substituted for something called puhul dosi in Sinhala; chopped bits of candied winter melon.
Alcohol-spiked Christmas pudding.
Rose de kokis, or rose cookies, are delicate cookies made using a mould.
A slightly chipped molar on the right side of my jaw (a gift from biting into a one rupee coin), is my number one association with Nan’s scrumptious Christmas pudding. Another Anglo festive perennial, it is made from a mixture of flour, candied fruit, currants, molasses and a whole lot more. Every year, a highly ritualised making process ensues, whereby Nan made sure that every family member took a turn stirring the pudding batter, reminding us all to make a wish as we did. Her version had 13 ingredients (including spices like nutmeg and cinnamon) — one for Christ and one for each of his 12 disciples. And it was stirred from East to West, reflecting the journey of the three Magi on their journey visit the infant Jesus. She would then drop a sterilised one rupee coin into the sticky, tar-like slurry to bring luck (oh, the irony!) to whoever found it during the final pudding reveal in all its gooey, steamed glory. And always lit on fire once the brandy-laced butter sauce was poured over.
Nan also excelled at making kalaadi. This iconic Anglo-Indian sweet from Calcutta—one of the main bastions of the Anglo-Indian community—is a combination of milk, sugar, and khoya (reduced milk). Shaped into a small, round ball, and often flavoured with cardamom or rose water. Nan writes in her book that the name ‘kalaadi’ comes from its characteristic dark colour, a result of caramelising the sugar, lending an earthy, almost edible petrichor-like taste.
Dipping a rosette-shaped iron mould with a long wooden handle into a thin batter (all-purpose flour, a bit of rice flour for crispiness, eggs and thick coconut milk) and then lowering it into a kadhai of hot oil, while humming a tune is how I remember Nan making rose de kokis. Also known as achappam in Tamil Nadu and Kerala, these delicate cookies—said to be of Dutch origin—would often threaten to shatter at the slightest touch. But they tasted divine, especially when sprinkled with black sesame seeds that give them a nutty finish.
But the most fun was when all eight of her grandkids sat down to make kul-kuls with Nan. This Anglo iteration of the traditional Diwali sweet of shakkar para, is made from a simple dough of flour, sugar, vanaspati, and a pinch of cardamom. We’d use everything from the back of forks to hair combs to press into the dough, so as to imprint the signature ridge-like grooves onto the kul-kuls’ surface. Once deep-fried, these ridges would hold the crystallised sugar syrup that these sweet pastry bits are dipped into. And like they say — no one can eat just one!
But then, that holds true not just for kul-kuls, but the entire gamut of Anglo-Indian sweets. Confections that epitomise the confluence of cultures. Edible heirlooms in desperate need of being saved from the slow ravages of time.
Raul Dias is a Mumbai-based food and travel writer who’s work can be found at raulontheprowl.blogspot.in
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