Hung-curd Fun (Lockdown cooking)

After a short struggle over working-from-home, life settled down to a good pace. The sweet shops were closed during the initial weeks but one couldn’t ‘lockdown’ the sweet tooth! In the initial days, one went back to the tried and tested recipes – custards, puddings, crème caramel, and cakes.

The traditional shrikhand

Dairy products being an essential commodity, together with our Amul milk we were getting the Amul curd. Suddenly we realized that the curd packs were piling and one odd afternoon I hung out a pack to drain the whey. The first time it was the regular cardamom flavoured shrikhand. This makes a nice and mildly chilled dessert for a summer evening. The only catch is that it is not versatile enough to go well with a Chinese or a Continental meal. Growing up in Bombay meant a childhood of many bought out or homemade shrikhand. In my first sales job, which entailed a good bit of travel, the standard dessert at our company guest house used to be the Amul shrikhand.



The curd packets set in my mind (pun intended). Each morning as my hubby planned dinner, my mind dwelt on possible hung-curd dessert variety. The cues were picked up from regular shrikhand or its fruity and most popular mango variant. The outcome was from indulgent to healthy.

 Alphonso - good rich colour and flavour

Himsagar - I was satisfied with the dressing.

Aam shrikhand was the obvious choice when a friend sent across the season’s Alphonso. While we did try a version with our very own Himsagar – the richness of colour, texture and flavour of the former remained unmatched. Once again it brought back memories of a Bombay girl spending her summer vacations in Calcutta. There would invariably be the regular teasing from the Uncles and cousins about which was the better mango. As a little girl I would get very upset, arguing a strong case in favour of the Alphonso and being ragged and outnumbered hopelessly. Now I am older and wiser and keep my beliefs to myself.



When there were a few slices of pineapple leftover after making the pineapple upside-down cake, these found its way into a black raisin and pineapple yoghurt dessert. This is the first time that I tried folding in some pineapple bits into the dish, giving it an almost pudding-like texture. Pineapple and yoghurt goes very well as anyone who has made or tasted a pineapple raita would know.

The pineapple variant would pass off as a pudding, any day!

The star of the series, however, was the apple-cinnamon bowl. The apples were grated and lightly stewed in a brown sugar syrup, with a dash of Sri Lankan cinnamon. This was blended into the hung-curd and a handful of black raisins were added for that perfect accompaniment to a Continental pie. 

As the days went by and lockdown got extended, one looked aghast at the slowly growing girth. Meals were more carefully planned with an eye on the calorie counter. Honey appeared on the breakfast table. It made me innovate that evening. I soaked some finely chopped walnuts and raisins in warm honey and blended this into the hung-curd. Some extra honey topping and a little more on the side to add as per taste absolutely did the trick!

The healthy honey-nut bowl

Every home must have faced a situation of over-ripe bananas. The internet was full of solutions from cakes to caramelized bananas and bread. Here, I was bananas over hung-curd and so the home got an innovative spin on the fruit. The good part about this dessert is that it has a body and you can decorate it to your liking with sliced fruits.

Now, one is back in the office and I have a dessert solution that is simple, healthy, versatile and actually very tasty.

#lockdowncooking #desserts #innovativedesserts #puddings #chilleddesserts