Mother’s Famous Jardalu Trifle

My mother was famous for this trifle. She would dismiss her efforts with a wave of her well-manicured hand: “It’s nothing. So easy.” What she didn’t tell most people was her special trick, in post-Independence, Prohibition-era Bombay, of using Drak-shasava, a herbal fortified wine sold at the chemist’s as an Ayurvedic remedy, which made it all right in the eyes of the booze police. Now, decades later, you can buy fortified wines in Bombay, but I recently took great glee in making Ma’s trifl