An island nation blessed with vast coconut plantations, cinnamon groves, tea estates and mangroves full of scuttling crabs—Sri Lanka is practically guaranteed global applause for its nuanced cuisine.
An island nation blessed with vast coconut plantations, cinnamon groves, tea estates and mangroves full of scuttling crabs—Sri Lanka is practically guaranteed global applause for its nuanced cuisine.
Ceramics and cinnamon were all that 2nd Century BCE traders and explorers could think about when they set their sights on Sri Lanka. The teardrop-shaped nation in the middle of the Indian Ocean was a prominent destination on the Maritime Silk Road, thanks to the country’s diverse and plentiful offerings, and easy access.
Traders’ ships pulled into port and loaded up, while their captains and deckhands lingered on land to replenish provisions, leaving behind their own culinary legacy in the process. Today, Sri Lankan cuisine is a heady union of influences from India, Indonesia, Arabia, Portugal, Britain and the Netherlands. Cooks and chefs around the country take their melting pot heritage and turn it into something at once distinctive, and delicious.
Bountiful ingredients occupy the type of menu that you’d expect of an island nation—coconut, rice and seafood, often united in a tongue-tingling curry of some variety. But then come the native herbs, vegetables and fruits that add depth to dishes. I love the vitamin-rich kohila (eaten raw in salads or sautéed with spices), mukunuwenna (a leafy green with nutritional and medicinal properties), and nivithi, aka Sri Lankan spinach. Not to mention the cashew apples, soursop, jackfruit and tamarillo tree tomatoes.
TL;DR (for those of you skimming): From savoury hoppers to fiery sambols, discover 10 must-try Sri Lankan street food dishes that capture the soul of the island. A flavour-packed guide to one of Asia’s most vibrant culinary cultures.
Is there anything better than a pancake for breakfast (or dinner, for that matter)? The Sri Lankan incarnation is hoppers, which begins with a batter of slightly fermented rice flour, coconut milk and a hint of sugar. The concoction is swirled in a small pan and fried until it resembles a bowl; I recommend adding an egg to the centre, accompanied by sweet and savoury sambol garnishes and curries laden with cashews, mango and fish.
But before you get to the toppings, you may want to load up any space on your plate with additional string hoppers. This princely breakfast dish uses a thicker batter than traditional hoppers. It’s squeezed through a pasta press to create unctuous noodles moulded into a thick crumpet. They’re steamed, and topped with the same condiments.
Sri Lankan cuisine is tasty on its own. But it’s elevated with the addition of sambol, a piquant relish that comes in a variety of flavours and spice levels. King of them all is pol sambol, which sees freshly grated coconut, red onion, dried chillies, lime juice and salt pounded together with a pestle and mortar. It’s the main accompaniment to hoppers, but Sri Lankans also enjoy it with roti, rice, or curry—or even by itself—a harmony needing no melody. At once sweet, savoury and spicy, seeni sambol is a bit like caramelised onion chutney. But with complex layers that unite cardamom, cinnamon, pandan, curry leaves and tamarind, plus salt and sugar to taste. It’s sticky and addictive, and a worthy topper to any hopper.
Eye-poppingly green, this healthful dish is part soup and part herbal porridge. It’s made from wild leafy greens like medicinal herb gotu kola and hathawariya, cousin of the asparagus. Add in fenugreek, garlic, coconut milk and rice, and you have a lassi-like beverage believed to have numerous health-giving properties, including aiding digestion, reducing cholesterol and boosting the immune system.
The archetypal Sri Lankan meal consists of a mini-banquet of fragrant seasonal curries, usually with a coconut base, and often with a good dose of spice. Popular varieties are laden with potatoes, carrots, eggplant and pumpkin, but more exotic varieties include meaty-textured young jackfruit, long okra-like drumsticks and bitter gourds, which resemble lumpy cucumbers. And then there are the crabs, prawns and lobsters. Your curry is always served with condiments (pickled fruit and vegetables, sambol, chutneys) and rice—white, brown or red—and is ideally eaten with your fingers.
Breakfast, lunch, dinner, midnight snack—dhal is a 24-hour Sri Lankan staple. This lentil curry is vegan, gluten-free, high in protein, and so addictive. Red lentils are typically cooked with onions, pungent green chillies and spices such as cinnamon, cumin, fenugreek and pandan leaves. If you’re familiar with Indian dhal, the island version stands out for its use of coconut milk rather than ghee as its base, and for the addition of curry leaves for a mild hum. Spoon it up using roti, naan or hoppers, or douse your rice with it. It is oft-accompanied by another curry.
Few restaurants in Sri Lanka fail to offer fish curry. The popularity of the dish means you can expect diversity in flavours, from north to south, east to west. Perhaps the most popular is ambul thiyal (sour fish curry), a dry curry that heroes a firm seafood, like tuna. The seasoning’s heart consists of garcinia cambogia, a tropical fruit grown in Sri Lanka and known for its healthful properties and tamarind-like sour flavour. Other than that, it’s mostly black pepper and salt, with regional variations adding notes of cinnamon, garlic and curry leaves.
Think of kottu as the Sri Lankan take on the Brits’ bubble and squeak—it’s leftovers, elevated into a dish that is at once a salve for the stomach, and the soul. Follow the lead of locals to stalls where the clatter of utensils signals the cutting of the roti; cooks are deft at cleaving this flat bread into thin strips over a hot plate, to which they add vegetables, spices, scrambled eggs, chicken and cheese. For a sweeter version, try pol roti made with shaved coconut. Kottu is a classic Sri Lankan street food—quick and easy to prepare, and best enjoyed with a cold Lion lager.
The Dutch introduced lamprais into Sri Lanka, but locals made them their own. Think of this as a bun-free version of a deconstructed, Asian-inspired burger: curried meat, yellow rice cooked in a spicy stock, cashews, sambol and boiled eggs, all steamed and served within a banana leaf. The authentic recipe includes frikkadels (Dutch-style meatballs), with many elaborate trimmings—complex, because every internal element requires its own cooking before being wrapped within the banana leaf.
For the sweetest ending to any meal, order a serving of watalappan. This dish unites Sri Lanka’s culinary trifecta: coconut, cardamom and nutmeg. Add a grating of dark jaggery (palm sugar) and you have a silky, creamy coconut custard—with lots of aerated bubbles—given a textural crunch by the addition of chopped nuts. I recommend cashews.
If you see a Sri Lankan man up a coconut tree, chances are he’s collecting sap for a toddy. Toddy is an alcoholic wine produced from the sap of the coconut flower; one tree can provide a couple of pints of the liquid per day. It can be further distilled to make spirits like arrack. And there’s always thambili, or sweet king coconut water, for the morning after.
Talk to one of our travel specialists to tailormake your stay to any of our destinations