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THE CRISPY EDGES, the soft and chewy interior, the glossy golden-brown surface, the disc drenched in ghee and sugar syrup — the malpua is a sweet beloved across the Indian subcontinent for a reason (or as we’ve just demonstrated, several reasons). Several accounts have delved into this history of India’s “oldest sweet” — tracing its earliest mentions in a text no lesser than the Rig Veda itself — and its evolution from a barley flour pancake doused with honey, to the wheat/maida variant redolent with spices and sugar.
In India, Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh, the malpua has much in common, although few differences exist in the preparation and inclusion of certain ingredients. It is a staple of festive occasions, most famously Holi (as also Ramzan) and is part of the offering at many renowned temples.
While you may have sampled the typical malpua (and even its myriad Indian toppings, like rabri), there are variants of the sweet — and in some cases, distant cousins — found in parts of the world. Here’s a glossary of the better-known ones:
Apupa: How the Rig Veda refers to the dish we now call “malpua”; the apupa was made of barley flour fried in ghee and served with honey. Later recipes introduced ingredients such as wheat flour, milk, sugar, spices.
Related — Kanavapuva. Early Buddhist references to a malpua-like dish, made of broken rice.
Pupalika: An ‘inverted’ apupa, pupalika/pupalike is a “sweet cake fried in ghee”. The pancake has a stuffing of jaggery, instead of being immersed in honey.
Related — Adhirasam (Tamil Nadu) / Anarsa (Maharashtra) / Ariselu (Telangana, Andhra Pradesh) / Arisa (Odisha) / Arsa (Uttarakhand) / Kajjaya (Karnataka) / Neyyappam (Kerala). While these dishes too have a passing resemblance to the pupalika, being pancakes sweetened with jaggery and deep-fried, the batter/dough tends to be rice-based, making this a distinct subset of desserts.
Amalu: In Odisha, the malpua is known as “amalu”, and forms part of the sakala/sandhya dhupa (morning/evening food offering) to Lord Jagganath at the famous Puri temple.
Malpoa: The Bengali malpua/malpoa distinguishes itself from its siblings due to its texture and the addition of semolina (rava) and fennel (saunf) to the recipe.
Pua Pitha: Bangladesh’s malpua has mashed bananas in the batter, in the most common iteration of this dish. (The region’s cuisine has over 100 types of “pithas”, both sweet and savoury.)
Malpuri: A specialty of the Chitrapur Saraswats of India’s Kanara coast. This version of malpua has flour, semolina, sugar, soda bicarb, saffron and cashew.
Malpuwa / Pua / Marpa (in Newari): The Nepali malpua is a thick and fluffy breakfast dish that can have ingredients like wheat and rice flour, sugar, coconut, dates, cashews, almonds, cardamom and milk. While it is a must on Holi, it is also had as a breakfast item along with gwaramari (literally translates to “round bread”; a type of dumpling) and jerry swari (jalebi with a deep-fried flatbread). A cup of hot milk tea is essential to complete this meal.
Malpura: Pakistani malpua. Egg and mawa may be added to the basic malpua recipe.
Hotteok: Sweet stuffed South Korean pancakes that are similar to the pupalika. Hotteok is made of wheat flour, water, milk, sugar and yeast, with a filling of brown sugar.
Qayqanaq: This pancake is indigenous to Azerbaijan; while its base is similar to that of a regular pancake, it also incorporates spices like cardamom, cinnamon, saffron, and dry fruits like crushed walnuts.
Related — Chebab (Emirati) / Oladyi (Russian) / Serabi (Indonesian). The chebab is prepared with yeast or a sourdough starter, and has plenty of cardamom and saffron that complement the date molasses the pancake is usually served with. Oladyi is eaten with sour cream, while serabi is had with kinca syrup (a type of coconut sauce). It is important to note that these three pancake varieties are made in a pan, and not deep-fried.
Ataiyef: Imagine if a malpua was stuffed with ricotta cheese, deep-fried, and dipped in chopped pistachio nuts before being slathered in shira (a rosewater-scented simple dessert syrup from Aleppo). This is what the ‘ataiyef of the Jewish community in Syria is like.
Qatayef: This Arabic delicacy is essentially a folded pancake that is stuffed with dry fruits and ashta (which can be prepared with semolina, cornstarch, milk, vanilla, mascarpone cheese and bread), deep fried and dipped in simple syrup.
Related — Zlebiye. This Syrian deep-fried pancake is filled with clotted cream and topped with powdered sugar, ground cinnamon and crushed pistachios.
