New Delhi, Aug. 12 -- At around 6pm every day, after her work calls wrap, 28-year-old Sonia Sharma reaches for a cookie. But this isn't the buttery, processed kind she grew up sneaking from a tin box. It's dense, crumbly, made with whole wheat, ghee, jaggery-and a hint of ajwain and mulethi. "It tastes familiar, like something my grandmother might have made," she says. "But now it comes with a nutrition label and words like 'immune support' and 'digestive health.'"

Sharma, a marketing executive in Noida, is part of a rising wave of Indian consumers trading comfort snacking for functional eating. She still loves her evening chai, but the sev has been swapped for roasted makhana with sea salt and protein chips. "I don't count calories," sh...