Shrikhand, Amrakhand and Piyush Dairy Sweets

Mumbai keeps one of its sweetest traditions in a square of muslin. Shrikhand begins as plain dahi, tied up and hung until the whey drains away and what remains — chakka, a thick and faintly tart curd — can be beaten with sugar until it turns glossy.

• Cardamom goes in, then saffron steeped in a spoon of warm milk, sometimes a grating of nutmeg, and the whole is chilled and scattered with slivered pistachio and charoli.
• It is the dessert of the Maharashtrian and Gujarati festive thali, and it is eaten not as a final course but alongside hot puris, in the middle of the meal. Summer rewrites the recipe.
• From roughly March to June, when Konkan mangoes reach the city's fruit markets, sweet counters fold pulp into the same base and sell it as amrakhand — paler, softer-set, tasting of orchard rather than saffron, and gone again by the time the monsoon arrives.
• Piyush is the third member of the family and the least known outside Maharashtra: shrikhand or chakka loosened with buttermilk or milk into a thick, drinkable pour, spiced with cardamom and nutmeg and served ice-cold by the glass at neighbourhood dairies.
• On a humid Mumbai afternoon it does the work of a dessert and a cold drink at once.
• There is no ticket and no single address here; this is a trail rather than a monument.
• The densest concentration sits in Dadar West, where Maharashtrian dairies and mithai counters around Ranade Road and Gokhale Road sell shrikhand by weight in flat steel-lidded boxes, with more counters in the Gujarati and Marwari sweet shops of Girgaum, Kalbadevi and Matunga.
• Festival weeks — Gudi Padwa, Ganesh Chaturthi, Diwali — bring queues onto the pavement and the saffron version at its most generous, while an ordinary weekday evening is calmer and the stock just as fresh.
• Half a kilo travels well for a few hours; longer than that and it wants a refrigerator.
• Eating vegetarian around these counters is straightforward, though Mumbai is a city where vegetarian and non-vegetarian kitchens sit side by side, so it is always worth a glance at the board before ordering.
• Dadar West's snack counters turn out batata vada, misal and sabudana khichdi, and many are vegetarian-only — confirm at the counter rather than assuming.
• The Gujarati farsan shops nearby sell khaman, fafda and dhokla by weight, and Matunga, a short hop away, is known for its South Indian dosa and filter-coffee houses, several of which are fully vegetarian and again best confirmed when you sit down.
• If you avoid gelatin, ask about any set dessert; traditional shrikhand, amrakhand and piyush are simply milk, curd, sugar and spice.