Get ready for a drool parade, as we bring to you some of the lesser-known yet popularly enjoyed desserts of Bihar that you might not even have heard of before. By Tanvi Jain
1. Thekua
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A dry sweet that is believed to have originated in India and Nepal, this is one of the most popular desserts of Bihar and holds great importance during the Chhath puja. It’s traditionally made in pure ghee, along with ingredients such as wheat flour, caramelised sugar and jaggery. Apart from Bihar, it is also famous in parts of Eastern Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, West Bengal, and Teri region of Nepal. Till date, the people of Bihar prefer homemade Thekua, fried in a kadhai on a choolha, especially during the festival. The best part about this dessert is that just two pieces are enough to keep your stomach at peace for a couple of hours. Care to make it interesting? Combine it with masala tea or green tea, or you can even add dates or bananas to it. Although the famous dessert is easily available at any sweet shop across the state, but Ladoo Gopal Sweets in Patna, is one place you can try. The average cost is around INR 600 per kilogram.
2. Khaja
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#khaja #sweets #foodporn #foodlover When amazing art meets food.by @samruddhiganar007
Another famous dessert of Bihar, also well-known across Odisha, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Nepal — Khaja is considered auspicious and is offered as prasad during festivals and pujas; for example, at the Jagannath temple of Odisha, during Chhath Puja in Bihar, etc. The sweet is generally prepared from wheat flour stuffed with mawa, and deep-fried in sugar syrup. The Silao Khaja found in Silao city of Bihar’s Nalanda district is dry and sweet, with multiple layers, and is also a major source of income, as many specially visit this place only to buy sweets, mostly from the neighbouring states of Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. Khaja is believed to have originated during the reign of the Maurya dynasty in Silao between Nalanda and Bihar. Termed as the king of sweets by food experts, some believe that its journey began from Andhra Pradesh as Kakinada Khaja. One of the best places to have Khaja is the Silao Khaja Bhandar in Silao town. The average cost of this dessert is somewhere around INR 100 per kilogram.
3. Pitha
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A Bihari cuisine popular in the Mithila region, Pitha is a rice cake made mostly from either rice flour or wheat flour. It’s a famous dish in parts of Jharkhand, Odisha, West Bengal, Kerala, Assam, Nepal and Bangladesh. Pitha can be both sweet or savoury. While the former is stuffed with ingredients such as sugar, jaggery, date and palm syrup along with dry fruits like cashew, pista, etc., the latter has vegetables such as cauliflower, cabbage, potato, etc. stuffed in it. In Bihar, it is commonly known as Dal Pitha too, where after soaking dal (lentil) for a few hours, a paste is formed and filled into a wheat flour dough, and then either fried or baked. Harilal Sweets in Patna is where you should go for some delicious kaju pitha roll, available both online as well as at the shop for around INR 1,280 per kilogram.
4. Dehrori
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Though its origin lies in Chhattisgarh, it is a famous dessert of Bihar today, and is a staple festive sweet on occasions such as Holi. Dehrori is like dumplings made of rice and curd and then fried in ghee and sugar syrup and then garnished with roasted dry fruits. It takes one full day to prepare this dessert as the batter needs to be kept overnight and then prepared the next day. You can also buy the dessert from Mahajan Tilkut and Sweets shop in Gaya
5. Dudhauri
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A traditional dish of both Bihar as well as Jharkhand, Dudhauri is another festive speciality. The ingredients used to make Dudhauri are similar to that of kheer– rice, milk, sugar. The rice is first boiled and then mixed with milk, which is then cooked until it’s dry. Later, the preparation is put in a mixer or mashed manually to form a paste. Once the past is formed, it’s rolled into small dumplings to further be fried in sugar syrup, and served hot. One of the popular places to have Dudhauri from is Mohan sweets in Patna
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