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You heard right - there's no catch! Sugarless gulab jamuns, pista barfi and kalakand too! These impossibilities have been made into realities by an enterprising businessman. You probably don't know a banker who's also a mithaiwala, so let's introduce you to one! Sandeep Khosla of New York is a successful mortgage banker who's also raking in the bucks with his invention - sugarless mithai. He laughs, "Imagine that! An MBA from NYU making mithai!"
The name of his company is Meethaeee and he says, "My mithai is special. It's for those people who have not tasted mithai for years and are not allowed to have sweets. It's for diabetics, even for kids who are diabetic."
Meethaee came into existence by fluke, when Khosla asked a halwai to make sugar-free mithai for a diabetic friend. It was a fiasco at first, tasting very bitter. Khosla persisted, experimenting with one percent milk, Splenda and Sweet and Low, using different consistencies and temperatures. Now he says if you keep two gulab jamuns together - one regular and the other sugar-free - you are not going to be able to tell the difference. He says, "There's no aftertaste."
He has patented the procedure here and in the United Kingdom, and has been selling the sweets to restaurants, individuals, temples and gurudwaras. For a Durga Puja celebration, he provided 150 pounds of mithai for 800 people. The average retail is $12 per pound. At a recent dinner event, Khosla saw an elderly, diabetic man tucking into a plate full of the sugar free barfi and gulab jamun before dinner. The blissful gent said, "I don't want to eat dinner - I eat dinner everyday! I'm just going to eat sweets!" Sounded sweet to Khosla. |
