Year of the Choux?

A recap of how the imported dessert revolution has swept Mumbai since 2004 and a prediction about 2014's dessert du jour

The brownie
Is it a cake? Is it a cookie? Is it fudge? Actually, a good brownie, in texture and flavour, should be all of the above and pregnant with chocolate (or not, in the case of a blondie). Before Aadore Sayani and Kinaz Messman Harchandrai started Sleight of Hand and Theobroma (in 2004), respectively, sweet-something searchers had to head to 5-stars patisseries. But after one bite, nay crumb, of the original 19th Century American hybrid, the trend of Mumbai's dessert du jour officially kicked off.

Gelato & yoghurt
After being weighed down with butter-crammed goodness, 2006 saw the rise of cold and creamy, a.k.a. gelato with Yasser Ali launching India's first artisanal gelateria. It might not have had the fancy trapping of other gelato parlours but once you licked on Amore's cool creations, you knew what the fuss was all about. Frozen dessert saw a cold wave of resurgence in 2010 with chains opening and closing faster than anyone could say: one vanilla yogurt, please.

The cupcake
Before cold confectionery came back into vogue, Mumbai was hit by the cupcake craze. Frankly, we're still trying to live this Alice in Wonderland confection-hangover down. Because by the time 2009 rolled in, every home baker, pastry shop and boutique store was pushing dainty pleasure in morsels-sized portions. Herd mentality. Some good, some bad and some just dry. Our picks of the best include Bandra's Butterfly, Rebecca Vaz's The Baking Tray, Sugar Rush by Malika-Rahat Khan and Aashiyana Shroff's Tart.

The macaroon
Mumbai hasn't been the same since Le Cordon Bleu graduate Pooja Dhingra launched her patisserie in 2010. Sure, others tried perfecting this light-as-air baked confection best described as meringue-cookies and cousin to the Italian amaretti, but no one managed to quite like Le15.

The cookie & cronut
Last year was the year of the C. We are certain that cronut (a croissant crossed donut) creator Dominique Ansel had no idea that his invention would make him famous from Japan to India via NYC. Currently, Ellipsis, Theobroma and Tart make the best indie-avatars. As for cookies, you have Sweetish House Mafia's Miss Sweetish to blame/ thank for all those cookies cravings.

The donut
When the people behind Ping Pong and Cafe Mangi decided to bring down Singapore's quaint donut chain to Delhi (2008), followed by Mumbai in 2009, they had no inkling that we'd be standing in neat long lines for fried, glazed rings. This year, says Mad Over Donuts' Gaurav Goenka, expect bubble tea, cronuts and cookies — in all the usual suspect flavours.

Dessert in a jar
Cookie dough, caramel and cream, hazelnut creme, black forest, apple custard pie, lemon blueberry angel food cake, s'mores. Phew! We're not quite sure where the dessert in a jar trend started but what we do know is that Kiran Salaskar's Country Of Origin does them best. Lick, lick, slurrp.

Coming up: Choux
The humble choux pastry is cream-filled, light and airy and likely to flood dessert counters this year, borrowing from the love it enjoys in Paris. There, Choux a la Creme or Cream Puffs are new favourites. Le15, Knead With Love, Celebrations Fine Confections, Marie Antoinette and Candies do them best. — Bhairavi Jhaveri

Red velvet
Red alert! While we may not be fans of food colouring, no one (not even us) can take away from the fact that everyone loves red-velvet anything. Brownies, cake pops, cupcakes — nothing proved immune to this 'Devil's food'. Bakery books tell us that the ruby red colour of this light and spongy cake is thanks to colour additives, beetroot and the result of a chemical reaction between cocoa powder and acidic buttermilk. Vinegar, often generously added to the batter, also acts as a colour changing catalyst.