I can’t imagine a summer without sherbets. In May and June, you will find my kitchen pantry lined with bottles of Rooh Afza, bright green khus (vetiver) syrups, orange squashes, and more. The latest addition is the MarimBula hibiscus syrup. Initially, I was curious if the flavour would be close to the rhododendron one, which I often ask friends to pick up from a small organic store in Himachal Pradesh during their travels. It’s actually quite different. The MarimBula syrup is not high on the cloying sweetness one associates with floral varieties. Neither does it have an overwhelming fragrance. It’s pleasant, refreshing and goes really well with lemon. Over the past month, I have been using it in mocktails and shakes. However, the flavour of the hibiscus really comes out in iced teas and lemonades. A one-litre bottle costs ₹850.—Avantika Bhuyan
Indian Ocean are essentially a live band, even a jam band if you will. They are an electrifying live act, with suitably long, meandering and trippy solos. So it’s a bit strange they haven’t given us more live albums. Instead, after a nine-year gap, they are back with a studio album, Tu Hai. What’s not to love. The first track they have released digitally, Jaadu Maaya, is dark and apocalyptic: There’s climate change, there are dead bodies and governments. It stays close to the band’s radical folk roots, laced with contemporary themes. This is not folk rock, it’s rebel rock. Indian Ocean are screaming at the sun and the poison flooding around them, just as in a live show. We should be listening. Listening hard. —Dipankar De Sarkar
I am an Instagram content hoarder, which means I save Reels that end up languishing, never to be rewatched. A few days ago, though, I discovered an account that broke this habit. An online fitness coach, @aadamrichardson, posts fun videos of stretches that his bio claims help “defrost from your desk”. He shows beginner’s mobility workouts for hips, simple stretches to unknot shoulders and easy movements to thaw a stiff body— no bulging muscles, impossible weight-lifting or limited-edition sportswear to intimidate viewers like me. My physiotherapist taught me some of the stretches months ago and I promptly forgot them. Ergo, Richardson’s friendly content and Instagram’s save function have come to the rescue. — Jahnabee Borah
I have never been to Lonavala but I associate it with two things: Maganlal’s chikki (especially the coconut one) and Cooper’s fudge. I had them for the first time five-six years ago, when someone came back bearing these gifts from the hill station town in Maharashtra. The taste lingered in memory—like varkey biscuits from Ooty and chocolate barfi from Prem Sweets, Jammu. Recently, I tasted Cooper’s fudge again: 250g boxes each of walnut fudge and plain chocolate fudge. The walnut fudge was exactly the way I remembered it: nutty, melt in the mouth, just the right amount of sweet. A “warning” on the signature white and red box states that their “products are not given for sale to anyone or any shop, genuine stuff can be had only at Cooper’s Lonavla”. It’s an over 80-year-old shop, with an equally old recipe. Good things come steeped in calories.—Nipa Charagi