Light up your Diwali table with this collection of vibrant and delicious Indian desserts and sweet lassis. You’ll find festive Diwali recipes from chefs and cookbook authors like Manheet Chauhan, Hetal Vasavada, Khushbu Shah, and Vijay Kumar, who blend classic flavors like saffron, rose, and cardamom in traditional and inventive iterations — from jewel-toned falooda to crackly jalebi to burfi-inspired bark and cake. Whether you’re planning a Diwali spread or simply craving something fragrant and celebratory, this lineup delivers creamy, chewy, crunchy, and cooling pleasures in every bite and sip.
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Pista Burfi Bark
Inspired by burfi — a fudgy, milk-based South Asian sweet — Hetal Vasavada makes a pistachio bark topped with melted white chocolate, edible flowers, and just a touch of 24-karat gold or pure silver leaf for a celebratory sheen.
Jalebi
This Persian-origin sweet, beloved across India, is piped in concentric coils, fried, and soaked in saffron–cardamom syrup for a lacquered, glassy crunch. Hetal Vasavada uses a quick batter (yogurt and baking soda) rather than a long fermentation, with precise cues for oil temperature and the syrup’s one-string consistency. The key is timing: Warm syrup and immediate dunking ensure proper absorption and crisp texture.
Royal Falooda
Greg DuPree / Food Styling by Rishon Hanners / Prop Styling by Heather Chadduck Hillegas
Author of the cookbook AMRIKAN: 125 Recipes from the Indian American Diaspora, F&W’s Khushbu Shah shares her recipe for a striking rose-scented falooda. It’s a riot of textures, a layered dessert that stacks rose jelly, chia (or sabja) seeds, and tender vermicelli under a pour of rose-syrup–sweetened milk. A scoop of vanilla ice cream melts into the glass, trailing ribbons of pink and cream.
Ombré Coconut Burfi Cake
Inspired by classic coconut burfi, this layer cake from cookbook author and blogger Hetal Vasavada tucks a chewy coconut filling inside Swiss meringue buttercream. A shower of purple-to-white coconut flakes creates a celebratory ombré that feels tailor-made for the holiday table. The crumb stays incredibly moist thanks to coconut milk.
Mango-Cashew Kulfi Pops
Victor Protasio / Food Styling by Torie Cox / Prop Styling by Thom Driver
Chef Maneet Chauhan shares a recipe for kulfi-inspired pops, which blend saffron-stained milk, mint, cardamom, and soaked cashews with canned kesar mango pulp. The addition of sweetened condensed milk and cream deliver kulfi’s characteristic richness, then the mixture is frozen in molds and finished with pistachios for crunch.
Pineapple Kesari
Greg Dupree / Food Styling by Micah Morton / Prop Styling by Claire Spollen
Vijay Kumar, chef-partner at New York City’s Semma, toasts sooji (rava or semolina) in ghee, then hydrates it with saffron-infused syrup and pineapple for a golden, aromatic set sweet. Plumped raisins and toasted cashews give added texture to the creamy, sliceable semolina. Pressed into a pan and chilled, the kesari cuts into neat squares for easy serving.
Mango Lassi
Matt Taylor-Gross / Food Styling by Barrett Washburne
Chandra Ram’s blender lassi is a swift, two-minute swirl of plain yogurt, mango, water, and lime juice, adjusted to a drinkable consistency. Ram recommends using kesar mango purée for its aroma and sweet-tart flavor. Add water as desired to thin the drink; Greek-style yogurt, which is strained, will require more water than traditional yogurt.
Cardamom Shortbread Cookies with Dulce de Leche Peda Filling
Hetal Vasavada’s shortbread cookies are warmly spiced with freshly ground cardamom, sandwiched with dulce de leche (inspired by peda, a creamy milk fudge from South Asia), and finished with a white chocolate drizzle. Edible flower petals and gold or silver leaf make the cookies party-ready, and they keep well for make-ahead assembly.
Marigold Poori and Rose Halwa
Maneet Chauhan serves fried saffron-scented pooris dusted with marigold sugar alongside a rose water syrup–enriched semolina halwa, which she tops with pistachios and rose petals. It makes for a striking and celebratory holiday plate.
Mango Ras Malai
Greg Dupree / Food Styling by Micah Morton / Prop Styling by Claire Spollen
For this lush version of the beloved paneer-in-milk sweet, Vijay Kumar layers classic chenna cheese balls with a reduced saffron rabdi enriched with Alphonso mango pulp. The method details kneading the curds until smooth, simmering in syrup, and chilling the chenna in the rabdi overnight to absorb maximum flavor. Garnish with pistachios or edible flowers for an even more festive presentation.
Cardamom Yogurt Cake with Mango Lassi Icing
Greg Dupree / Food Styling by Chelsea Zimmer / Prop Styling by Christina Daley
Hetal Vasavada brushes this tender, cardamom-scented loaf cake with warm mango preserves while still hot to seal in moisture. The simple icing echoes mango lassi: powdered sugar, mango jelly, yogurt, and lemon juice. Chopped pistachios add crunch, while fresh mango slices can be added just before serving for extra flair and flavor.
Spiced Pumpkin Lassi
San Francisco–based chef Rupan Bhagat shares this seasonal riff on lassi, blending roasted squash with yogurt for a drink that’s creamy, lightly sweet, and spiced for fall. Bhagat builds flavor by blooming whole spices in oil, then simmering pumpkin (or kabocha) in milk before chilling and blending with yogurt and sugar. The technique yields a luxuriously smooth, thick lassi.
