The small, soft, edible bones of fresh sardines and smelts and canned bone-in fish like salmon are valuable sources of calcium.

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The most popular gift is mithai (Indian sweets), and shops are filled with a spectacular array specially prepared for this festival, from thickly cut squares of barfi (a fudge-like sweet, often coated with a thin film of edible silver leaf) , to soft syrupy gulab jamuns (deep-fried balls of dough) and spongy rasgullas (sweetened cream cheese balls flavoured with rose water).

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Continuing the theme of found food, a soft-shell crab is presented as an edible beach treasure, surrounded by amaranth grains for sand and brown-butter sauce for seawater.

NEWYORKER: Atera