12-06-2025
- Lifestyle
- New Indian Express
Butter, Bread, and Belonging
Over the past week, I've found myself adrift in a sea of change. The sort of change that leaves you grasping for something—anything—familiar. I've always sought solace in the known when the world around me shapeshifts. But oddly enough, this time, it wasn't my usual comfort food that I turned to. No khichdi, no steaming bowl of dal-chawal to anchor me. Instead, quite out of character, I ordered dessert.
At first, it felt like a spontaneous indulgence—perhaps even frivolous. But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. Somewhere, in the recesses of memory, that sugary, saccharine moment had its roots. It took me back to Dehradun, where my maternal family lived—a hill town known as much for its salubrious air as for its timeless bakeries. There, everything smells faintly of vanilla essence and old-world charm.
Then came Assam, where I spent part of my growing-up years in a small industrial town on the edge of the state. We had one bakery. Just one. And the sheer thrill of getting a pineapple pastry from there felt akin to winning the Pulitzer. That slice of cake, yellow-tinted cream and all, was joy in its purest form.
It's only now that I realise: I wasn't craving dessert last week. I was seeking comfort. The same, specific comfort that those early confections once brought me.
Even Delhi, where I moved as a teenager, welcomed me with its own bakery trail. I remember my uncle—always impeccably dressed, with a shiny maroon Ford Escort—taking me to Frontier Bakery in Karol Bagh. We'd emerge with boxes of pista biscuits and veg patties, the car redolent with their buttery perfume. Later, I discovered Wenger's, that relic of Connaught Place, with its spiced plum cake in winter—a slice of colonial nostalgia that has never quite faded.
Growing up, I came to realise something essential. However far I travelled, no matter how many truffle-laced risottos or artisanal mille-feuilles I sampled, the quiet joy of the local bakery remained unshaken. There's something profoundly honest about a good loaf of bread. And even more so, about buttered toast.
My husband—fiercely loyal to its charms—won't have anything else on long drives. And not just any buttered toast. There's a method to his devotion: the bread must be toasted to a light golden hue, just enough for the edges to crunch but the middle to stay soft. The butter—never cold, never too warm—must be slathered generously while the toast is still hot, so it melts into the crevices, seeping through to create that perfect marriage of crisp and soft, salt and warmth.
At first, I found it charming. Then I found it profound. Because isn't that what comfort truly is? Not grand, elaborate gestures, but small,
precise rituals that hold the soul together. There's something almost sacred in the way the butter glistens and pools, the smell ever so slightly nutty, the first bite giving way with a soft crunch and a whisper of warmth.
It's remarkable, isn't it, how the simplest foods build the strongest emotional scaffolding? Especially now, in an age where a swipe on your phone can summon award-winning menus to your door. Yet come a weekend evening, and it's the neighbourhood mithai shop
or the timeworn bakery that's brimming with people—each person waiting not just for a snack, but a slice of something familiar.
This, perhaps, is why Delhi's oldest food institutions still inspire near-religious devotion. Frontier's veg patty? Some will swear it tastes exactly as it did twenty years ago. Can we prove that? Perhaps not. But that's not the point. When you bite into something generations before you also cherished, it transcends taste. It becomes a memory. A kind of edible reassurance.
And so, when life feels uncertain, I find myself wandering into the narrow lanes of Old Delhi, seeking out pineapple pastries in family-run bakeries with flickering signboards and faded glass counters. There, amidst the hum of ceiling fans and the rustle of butter paper, I find what I need—not extravagance, but heart. And honestly, I couldn't ask for more.
