sweet dreams are made of these : sweet shops as major milk consumer

When one follows the milk chain in Bihar, you discover quickly that most of the informal milk chain to urban areas go to sweet shops. I was quite suprised, as in my world milk has to be transformed in yogurt and cheese!

a typical sweet shop

We had a longer discussion with the owner. He get his milk through vendors who pick the milk from the farm. He pays about 34 rupees per liter for the best milk quality. The price is fixed based on the amount of condensed milk that he is able to make from a liter milk. So if a farmer mixes in water to get more milk, then he simply gets a lower price. 

making condensed milk in the back of the shop

In the back of the shop, there is a man with a huge pan, making condensed milk the whole day long. So we were wondering about milk shortages. And indeed, there are some peeks in demand, then he would first try to buy the packaged milk from the cooperative and then use powder milk. Interesting, as the packaged milk might also just be regenerated powder milk. 

The sweets tasted marvelously, whatever milk was used! And we proceeded our trip further.

the sweets