Once relegated to being merely functional, end of the
main meal sweet closing acts, desserts today have upped their ante. And how! Be
it with their unusual ingredients or totally outré presentation styles, they
truly are out there. We’ve curated a list of six of Mumbai’s most fantastical
desserts that have been elevated from the depth of being “just desserts” to
edible pieces of art.
By Raul Dias
Zen Pebbles at Typhoon Shelter
Designed to befuddle the diner—what with it being served together with a few real pebbles—this faux pebble dish is pure, undiluted drama on a platter. Accompanied to the table by a burning sage leaf bouquet, this dessert is conceived by dessert chef Solanki Roy and is available at Mumbai’s brand-new Sichuan-Cantonese cuisine restaurant, Typhoon Shelter. With her training in the weird-n-wacky approach to food at the über-experimental Gaggan Bangkok where she worked earlier, Chef Roy merged traditional flavours with a refreshingly contemporary approach to bring out this brilliant dessert. So, here we find two distinctly flavoured ‘pebbles’: one filled with a creamy caramel-vanilla mousse and the other with a hazelnut crunch. Both are then coated in a melted white chocolate exterior. The marble-like swirls on the pebbles are courtesy of a colour bath that they are dipped into and left to dry. And voila! You have in front of you one of Mumbai’s, nay, India’s most bizarre, yet yummy desserts.
At S-3, Second floor, Skyzone, Phoenix Mill Compound, Lower Parel, Mumbai-400013
Call 022-49193100
Cost Rs 1,195
Designed to befuddle the diner—what with it being served together with a few real pebbles—this faux pebble dish is pure, undiluted drama on a platter. Accompanied to the table by a burning sage leaf bouquet, this dessert is conceived by dessert chef Solanki Roy and is available at Mumbai’s brand-new Sichuan-Cantonese cuisine restaurant, Typhoon Shelter. With her training in the weird-n-wacky approach to food at the über-experimental Gaggan Bangkok where she worked earlier, Chef Roy merged traditional flavours with a refreshingly contemporary approach to bring out this brilliant dessert. So, here we find two distinctly flavoured ‘pebbles’: one filled with a creamy caramel-vanilla mousse and the other with a hazelnut crunch. Both are then coated in a melted white chocolate exterior. The marble-like swirls on the pebbles are courtesy of a colour bath that they are dipped into and left to dry. And voila! You have in front of you one of Mumbai’s, nay, India’s most bizarre, yet yummy desserts.
At S-3, Second floor, Skyzone, Phoenix Mill Compound, Lower Parel, Mumbai-400013
Call 022-49193100
Cost Rs 1,195
Literally gliding all the way to your table, this totally wacky dessert at Mumbai’s hip-n-happening Thai-Robata restaurant Izaya, makes a dramatic entry alright. Enough to have the whole restaurant stop in its tracks and gawp! The Levitating Dacquoise—sitting pretty in a glass bowl—hovers gently above a black plastic base, all thanks to the quantum mechanical effect called diamagnetism. Here, an applied magnetic field, both, at the base of the specially made glass bowl, and atop the black base stand, creates an induced magnetic field in the opposite direction, causing a repulsive force which makes the bowl levitate. The dacquoise itself is a super light confection that is made up of Belgian Callebaut chocolate, Normandy Chantilly cream and Mahabaleshwar strawberries (when in season). A garnish of small almond meringues, edible nasturtium flowers, micro greens and gold leaf finishes off this almost-theatrical production with a flourish.
At NCPA, Gate No. 2, Nariman Point, Mumbai-400021
Call 022-22821212
Cost Price on request
The Godfather at The Runway Project
A signature of the menu at the super stylish The Runway Project restaurant, the equally stylish The Godfather dessert is a great trick on the senses. Inspired by the cult classic movie The Godfather that left an inedible mark and made an iconic fashion statement in the man’s world of style with slicked back hair and dark suits, the look continues to create a stir even today and, on your plate, too! So, what you have here is a dark Madagascar chocolate edible cigar-like shell that’s filled with a coffee cremeux and almond brittle tiramisu-center that opens with a waft of hickory smoke. The dessert comes with a real label of a cigar customised for The Runway Project to be carefully removed before indulging into it. The pleasure of smoking a ‘cigar’ while indulging in your dessert, now that’s The Godfather for you.
At 462 High Street Phoenix, Phoenix Mill Compound, Lower Parel, Mumbai-400013
Call 022-49151000
Cost Rs 575
A signature of the menu at the super stylish The Runway Project restaurant, the equally stylish The Godfather dessert is a great trick on the senses. Inspired by the cult classic movie The Godfather that left an inedible mark and made an iconic fashion statement in the man’s world of style with slicked back hair and dark suits, the look continues to create a stir even today and, on your plate, too! So, what you have here is a dark Madagascar chocolate edible cigar-like shell that’s filled with a coffee cremeux and almond brittle tiramisu-center that opens with a waft of hickory smoke. The dessert comes with a real label of a cigar customised for The Runway Project to be carefully removed before indulging into it. The pleasure of smoking a ‘cigar’ while indulging in your dessert, now that’s The Godfather for you.
At 462 High Street Phoenix, Phoenix Mill Compound, Lower Parel, Mumbai-400013
Call 022-49151000
Cost Rs 575
Black Marble Sesame Cheese Cake at Foo
Cottoning onto the black coloured food craze that has gripped the world of fine dining across the globe, this brand-new, Asian-style tapas restaurant—Foo—shows off its experimental side with this dramatic-looking, blackish-grey dessert made using a very traditional Asian and Indian sweet ingredient—sesame. Giving a fillip to the classic cheesecake, the black marble sesame cheese cake is the sum of its cream cheese, black sesame paste, and sour cream parts. Keeping the presentation simple, to let the rather non-conformist colours of this dessert show up, it is served atop a stone platter, with almond crumbs, a scoop of vanilla ice cream and a seasons sauce made out of mascarpone, sugar, cream and sesame paste drizzled all over it.
At Phoenix Mill Compound, High Street Phoenix, Lower Parel, Mumbai-400013
Call +91-8657407773
Cost Rs 350
Cottoning onto the black coloured food craze that has gripped the world of fine dining across the globe, this brand-new, Asian-style tapas restaurant—Foo—shows off its experimental side with this dramatic-looking, blackish-grey dessert made using a very traditional Asian and Indian sweet ingredient—sesame. Giving a fillip to the classic cheesecake, the black marble sesame cheese cake is the sum of its cream cheese, black sesame paste, and sour cream parts. Keeping the presentation simple, to let the rather non-conformist colours of this dessert show up, it is served atop a stone platter, with almond crumbs, a scoop of vanilla ice cream and a seasons sauce made out of mascarpone, sugar, cream and sesame paste drizzled all over it.
At Phoenix Mill Compound, High Street Phoenix, Lower Parel, Mumbai-400013
Call +91-8657407773
Cost Rs 350
Zen Forest at The Fatty Bao
Images of a moss-covered forest floor—gnarly twigs, et al—in autumn come to mind the minute this beautifully presented dish is put in front of you. Reflective of nature in all its pristine beauty, Zen Forest, a hot favourite at the pan-Asian restaurant The Fatty Bao, is a rather complex creation. As beautiful as it is to look at, the dessert takes even better. An amalgamation of multiple elements that come together perfectly on a platter, here, each element offers something special. The green tea moss and chocolate give a bit of sweet and bitterness, the yuzu parfait imparts a refreshing citrus favour, black sesame sponge and white sesame nougatine give the nuttiness and crunch element to the dessert. Whereas the bright pink-coloured beetroot sorbet along with the black pepper sorbet give it an earthy taste. Micro-greens round the dessert off, giving it a fresh herb-y taste.
At 2A, Trade View Building, Kamala Mills Compound, Lower Parel, Mumbai-400013
Call 022-62371500
Cost Rs 265
Images of a moss-covered forest floor—gnarly twigs, et al—in autumn come to mind the minute this beautifully presented dish is put in front of you. Reflective of nature in all its pristine beauty, Zen Forest, a hot favourite at the pan-Asian restaurant The Fatty Bao, is a rather complex creation. As beautiful as it is to look at, the dessert takes even better. An amalgamation of multiple elements that come together perfectly on a platter, here, each element offers something special. The green tea moss and chocolate give a bit of sweet and bitterness, the yuzu parfait imparts a refreshing citrus favour, black sesame sponge and white sesame nougatine give the nuttiness and crunch element to the dessert. Whereas the bright pink-coloured beetroot sorbet along with the black pepper sorbet give it an earthy taste. Micro-greens round the dessert off, giving it a fresh herb-y taste.
At 2A, Trade View Building, Kamala Mills Compound, Lower Parel, Mumbai-400013
Call 022-62371500
Cost Rs 265
This pretty-looking deconstructed version of the traditional Latin American, three-milk dessert of tres leches served at Luna, the European fine dining restaurant at The St. Regis has plenty of dramatic twists to it. To begin with, as mentioned before it is a deconstructed iteration which means that its butter cake-base is soaked in three kinds of milk: evaporated milk, condensed milk, and heavy cream and scattered all over the platter and not grouped together as in the traditional version. But here’s the most interesting twist, the milk that we’re alluding to is not any ordinary milk, but the tangy, much-acquired taste of goat’s milk. This takes the form of a wobbly panna cotta that is accompanied by granules of dehydrated 6% fat milk, a milk espuma and a milk micro sponge. The garnish is that of a shard of crystallised sugar, berries and micro greens.
At The St. Regis Mumbai, 462, Senapati Bapat Marg, Lower Parel, Mumbai-400013
Call 022- 61628422
Cost Rs 950
(An edited version of this article first appeared in the September 2018 issue of Go-Getter, the in-flight magazine of Go Airways)
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