The summer heat is upon us with a vengeance and beckons me to write about the cooler delights on the desi menu, the ageless neembo pani (lime water) and kulfi, the desi ice cream.

My earliest memory of eating kulfi is at Shezan Ampis, opposite the Metropole Hotel, and Spinzer, near the Gol Masjid (round mosque) in Defense. To my readers in their 40s and 50s; these two restaurants may have been your parents hangout and surely you must have some joyous memories of visiting these two snacking joints as children, eating kulfi and sipping chilled neembo pani. Today, I hope to take you down memory lane to mutually relive the happy childhood tale of kulfi and neembo pani.

History stands witness to the fashionable Middle Eastern import to the subcontinent called sherbet. The Persian word was a reference to a beverage of sweetened, diluted fruit juice that was often cooled with snow.

The well-informed traveler, Ibne Battuta talks about an occasion in the 14th century Delhi, at the time of the Delhi Sultanate where large hollow vessels were filled with a sugar sweetened drink, flavoured with rose water and fruit juice, pineapple, coconut, mango, orange, lime, melons and the list goes on. He wrote, ‘They offer cups of gold, silver and glass, filled with sugar-water. They call it sherbert and drink it before eating.’