In a pan, melt the butter. Add the apples with the lemon juice, raisins, brown sugar and water. Mix well and bring to a boil. Turn down the heat and simmer the mixture till the apple is cooked, soft and almost dry.

Use your spoon to break up the apple pieces a bit while they're cooking.

Add the ginger, garam masala and cinnamon powders and mix well. Cook for another minute and take the pan off the heat. Allow the mixture to cool.

In the meanwhile, run the crumbled paneer (or cottage cheese) with the sugar in your processor or mixer/ blender jar until it is smooth. Add the mascarpone and vanilla extract and run everything together just till very smooth.

To assemble the parfaits, take three glasses and put in about 2 tbsp of the apple mixture into each. Cover this with about 2 tbsp of the cheese mixture. Again layer another 2 tbsp of apple mixture and top with the remaining cheese mixture.

You can use a spoon to layer the cheese mixture or pipe it using a pastry tip. Chill the parfaits for at least 3 hours. Decorate with grated chocolate or nut brittle and serve.