Yummy Sri Lanka

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If you like curry, this is the place to be. In a word, Sri Lankan rice and curry is "great". It is served as several different curry dishes - such as potato, chicken, or green bean curries - with a large plate of rice. Eat it seperately, or just mix it all up, doesn't matter, it's good.

What we've eaten most, though, are Sri Lankan Short Eats, which are snacks in their English. They're essentially buns or rolls or pastries with a variety of filling. Much of them resemble Polish krokieciki, but instead of being filled with sauerkraut or mushrooms, they're filled with chicken, potato, or whatever curry. Excellent, and I've seriously eaten my share.

Hoppers are also popular, but I've not found them too appetizing. They're sort of like crepes, or Polish nalesniki, without anything on them, other than some alternative forms, like egg and cheese. I haven't tried the string hoppers yet, which are supposedly really good.

The best thing I've eaten so far has been Lamprai (Lamprais, Lamprey - there are various spellings, so I don't really know which one is correct). So, John, thanks for the tip. Lamprai is rice, a deepfried boiled egg, beef or chicken (I've seen the beef here, so I'd really recommend the chicken), some beets and other vegetables, all wrapped up in a banana leaf and baked for a little under an hour. It's quite a view when you unwrap the leaf; then, add a little chili paste for spice, and you've got an awesome, flavorful dish.

Klaudia's favorite dish so far has been a simple plate of boiled vegetables, but how they add so much flavor to a simplistic dish like this, I don't know. It's really nothing more than some carrots, green beans, potatos, and a whole head of garlic - unpeeled! - boiled together, with some spices that I cannot quite ascertain. It's a great dish and Klaudia - as someone who doesn't like garlic, pretty much on anything - ate the whole head of garlic (of course, you peel the garlic now before you eat it).

The beer here is good, but it's that sort of Asian tropical stuff good for hot weather, like Singha. Nothing too much to write home about, but respectable and good for the weather.

Before we arrived in Sri Lanka, I'd read that Sri Lankan food is some of the spiciest food in Asia, at an almost legendary level. Well, not quite. Of course you can argue that I've been getting the "white boy's" version of the food, however, I've sat down with the locals to eat from the same trough (no, litterally, at a buffet style table that looked like a trough) and have received thumbs up from them on my... ahem... spice eating prowess, while adding more chili paste or sombol. Honestly, I have to say I've eaten spicier salsa in San Diego, and the spice here in no way compares to the excess at Orichon Noodle House in LA or that place in Arlington, VA with the spiciest hot wings (maybe the spiciest thing) I've ever eaten in my life. So, no worries if you worry about spicy food: it's for flavor here.

No issues whatsoever with our stomachs so far. Hygiene is obviously subpar here - and I've cringed a couple times when they've grabbed my short eats with bare hands and wrapped them in newspaper pages - but that's not really gonna stop "this" eating machine. I've been a little more worried about Klaudia, but she's been able to take the lack of hygiene in stride as well (I'm proud of you, honey!). And we've kept ourselves clean and sanitized. We'll see how we do in India: many travelers have commented to us that Sri Lanka is India Jr., only that Sr. is a lot dirtier...

Well, I've just been served my dish of Devilled Fish (fried fish bits in a red sauce), so off to eat.

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Comments

[Ola]

Najbardziej rozbawiły mnie "krokieciki" :D Powodzenia i wróćcie cali! :)

[D MJ Binkley]

Please include some photos of food
Love to see some of the curries.

[Find K and T]

Yeah...
...we'll have to do a little better with this. Every time we're on our way to eat, we remind ourselves to take a picture, then, by the time we actually remember to take the picture, we've eaten our food...