Jayant Sukhadia started working in his family’s sweet shop as a teenager. Members of his extended family would join in on cooking/baking the sweets. He has always had a good sense about customer tastes and preferences, and, of course, a finely attuned palate for taste. These talents give him, alongside his grandfather, a acute business acumen and an ability to innovate. In the early 1980s, his grandfather had created a culinary innovation called "Mango Barfi," a sweet made by mixing condensed milk with mango pulp. "Mango Barfi" has since become one of the most popular sweets in India. Jayant continues that tradition. Once a client in New Jersey demanded a variety of sweet ["Kaju Anjir," a sweet made out of cashew and fig] which was gaining popularity in India. Although unaware of this recipe, Jayant improvised and ingeniously recreated Kaju Anjir for the client.
When Jayant Sukhadia moved to New York in the late 1980s, he began working with his older brother and father who had already established "Sukhadia sweets" in Edison, New Jersey. Jayant heard about Devon Avenue’s growing Indian population in the late 90s and decided to start a branch of Sukadia Sweets in Chicago. His success story is now common knowledge. His shop remains crowded during the Diwali festival and wedding seasons. Text by Holland Dvorak and Niyati Naik. |
On marriage season and sweets
Experimenting making a new sweet for the first time in the US
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