This Chennai home bakery is putting a better-for-you spin on cookies, brownies and more

When we heard that Little Miss Chef was back with a fresh batch of festive treats, we knew we had to dig in. The home bakery has been around for nearly 12 years, building a following for its cakes, cookies, and celebration bakes before taking a brief pause during the pandemic. Now back in business, it has introduced a new range of millet-based treats just in time for the festive season.

Millet flours, jaggery and balanced sweetness define the new baked range

We started with the Baked vada pav, and it disappeared remarkably quickly. Instead of the usual pav split around a fried potato vada, this version seals the filling inside a soft bun, with chutney and green chilli sitting neatly on top. It makes the whole thing wonderfully mess-free, but the real fun comes from biting into the chilli alongside the soft, savoury filling and pillowy bread. It packs the familiar vada pav kick without leaving you chasing chutney down your sleeve.

The sweet treats followed, with the Ragi bites and Oats and jowar cookies quickly becoming favourites. The latter carried a lovely nuttiness from the grains, with jaggery providing a mellow sweetness. The Jowar bites and Oats and wheat cookies brought more of the earthy character of their respective flours, with jaggery lending a gentle caramel-like sweetness. The Vanilla choco chunk and Chocolate choco chunk cookies were richer in comparison, studded with generous pieces of chocolate that were crumbly, gooey and satisfying through every bite. Then came the brownies, soft and moist beneath a delicate crisp top. Across everything we tried, the sweetness stayed remarkably well balanced. Nothing was cloying or sugar-heavy, making these particularly easy to keep reaching for.

What makes the newer range interesting is the baking philosophy behind it. The cookies are made without maida or refined sugar, using millet flours, jaggery, and butter instead. Working with millet flour comes with its own challenges, particularly when it comes to texture and structure, so the cookies can be slightly crumbly and drier than their conventional counterparts. The flavour, however, more than makes up for it.

INR 150 onwards. Available online.

Email: anoushkakundu@newindianexpress.com

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