January happens to be an especially celebratory month for my family and me. My younger brother’s birthday falls on the first day of the year. My parents’ anniversary arrives just a few weeks later. And my birthday beautifully closes out the entire month. For us, January is a month of indulgences, namely the sweet kind. It’s when we enjoy slices of birthday cake to our hearts’ content, savoring every single crumb and licking our plates clean of any frosting. It’s when we make it a point to request a complimentary dessert when we go out to eat, regardless of how full our bellies may be. But most importantly, it’s when we savor bowls upon bowls of my mother’s homemade rice pudding. In our Bengali household, traditional rice pudding is called Payesh. But to others within the Desi diaspora, it’s Kheer, Khiri, Phirni, Payasam, Paal Payasam and Gil-e-Firdaus. Many of these terms are rooted in Sanskrit: Kheer originates from the Sanskrit term kshira, which means milk or a dish made from milk; Payesh and Payasam originate …