Pistabarfi's New 'Mithai Bars' Bring Classic Indian Flavours To A Candy Bar Sillhoute
My father, unfortunately falling into the stereotype of his generation, was highly skeptical of anything modern. He'd always compare packaged snacks and sweets to homegrown delicacies, which in his eyes were far superior. Living in a small town, I'd get excited about a new snack that made it to the provision stores here; like a new flavour of Lays or a new chocolate brand like Reese's that didn't usually make it to the remote parts of the country. But my excitement would always be met with his cynicism. For him, everything 'new' already had a much better 'old' and Indian counterpart. He was an onion pakodas over French fries and ras malai over icecream kinda guy.
I didn't care for this comparison because we were evening-snack buddies. And while I was open to all our local vendors, popular for their signatures wadas and panipuris, whose carts had been in the same spots of the town for at least 20 years, whom he had a shared history with, he didn't quite return the favour with the same enthusiasm when I'd ask him to try a new flavour of Doritos. So even though my stubborn old dad is no longer with us, I wonder what he'd think of a confectionary that looked like a chocolate bar, but was actually Kaju Katli or Pista Barfi. I know for sure he'd have his mind blown. And I'd finally have gotten my checkmate moment.
Pistabarfi, a homegrown design-forward brand known for their traditional Indian mithais does the same with their latest 'Mithai Bars'. The brand notes "A Mithai Bar is a simple idea that involves changing the shape of mithai into a rectangular bar which can further be easily broken into small pieces to be had like any other sweet. All the ingredients and process of making remain the same. The authenticity of mithai stays intact because that's what we essentially believe in. Good old mithai is timeless and can't be replaced. Hence, Mithai Bar is not mithai re-imagined, but simply mithai re-shaped".
Doesn't this little modification of a mithai from Pistabarfi feel like a metaphor for the shift in our culture? We clash about how our generation is nothing like the ones before us. Our parents claim the same: that we are forgetting where we come from. But we aren't as different as we may appear. In fact, I haven't seen an appreciation for our identity like we have right now in online spaces, ever before in my life. Be it our films, music, textile traditions, travel destinations or cuisine: we love being Indian. And we're accepting as well as celebrating it more and more everyday.
Pistabarfi has given us the perfect symbol of our cultural identity in a contemporary India. It's almost as if they're saying, "We may look like a chocolate bar but inside we're still and will always be Kaju Katli", if you know what I mean.
Check out their new Mithai Bars here.
