What to eat in Sri Lanka: rice and curry, hoppers and kottu

Rice and curry, and the four kitchens behind it

Sri Lanka Tourism calls rice and curry the main meal of the island. A plate usually carries several dishes: rice with a meat or fish curry, dhal, papadum, mallum, a green salad, and a sambol or two, and a full lunch spread can run to eight small curries. The everyday curries run from jackfruit and breadfruit to lotus stem, banana flower and pumpkin, so a vegetarian has plenty to choose from.

The heat lives in the individual dishes, not in the meal as a whole. Kiri hodi, a coconut-milk gravy, is not spicy at all, dhal is mildly spicy and chicken curry very spicy; pumpkin curry is cooked with green rather than red chilli and stays mild. The two sambols that turn up most often are pol sambol, scraped coconut with red onion, chilli, lime and salt, often with Maldive fish, and lunu miris, onion, chilli flakes, salt and lime.

Behind that plate stand four kitchens. The Sinhalese bring kiribath, rice cooked in coconut milk, and festive sweets such as kavum, kokis and aluwa; the Tamil community dosai, idly, wadei and murukku; the Sri Lankan Muslim community biryani, faluda and wattalapam; and the Burgher community lamprais, rice and accompaniments baked in plantain leaves, a legacy of the Dutch.

The usual first trip passes through places where you can taste most of them. Our first-trip guide sets out the ten-day loop and its nights; this guide is about what is on the table at each stop.

• Sinhalese: rice and curry, kiribath with lunu miris, and festive sweets.
• Tamil: dosai, idly and wadei in the morning, and in the north the Jaffna crab curry and odiyal kool.
• Muslim: biryani, faluda and wattalapam.
• Burgher: lamprais in its leaf parcel.

Hoppers, string hoppers and kottu

Hoppers, appa, are bowl-shaped pancakes of fermented rice flour and coconut milk, cooked in small round pans so that they come out crisp round the edges and thicker at the bottom. A plain hopper comes with lunu miris and a spicy curry; an egg hopper has an egg cooked into the bowl; a honey hopper is the sweet one. Plain and egg hoppers are eaten as a main meal at breakfast and dinner, and hoppers are also sold as a tea-time street snack.

String hoppers, idiappa, are something else: rice-flour dough pressed into strands and steamed in small flat nests, served with dhal or a fish, meat or potato curry and pol sambol, again at breakfast or dinner. Pittu, rice or kurakkan flour steamed with grated coconut, is the third member of the family and comes with coconut milk in the morning.

For kottu, a cook chops a godhamba roti on a griddle with two metal spatulas, working in vegetables, egg or meat and spices, with a rhythmic clatter. It is one of the defining dishes of the island's street food, made in vegetable, chicken, cheese, beef, fish, seafood and mutton versions and as a string-hopper kottu, and it is usually a dinner dish. In Colombo, the tourism board's suggestion is the simplest: end the day on Galle Face Green with kottu or wade. Our Colombo guide has the green and the restaurants around it.

In Kandy, Balaji Dosai on D.S. Senanayaka Street, a vegetarian restaurant since 2008, serves dosai, idly and string hoppers, the last in sets of ten, from 7.00 AM to 10.00 PM every day, so it covers breakfast and dinner from one address. Its rice and curry runs only from 11 AM to 3 PM.

• Breakfast: egg hoppers or string hoppers with dhal and pol sambol.
• Dinner: kottu, or hoppers again with a curry.
• Order hoppers by the piece: a few plain ones and an egg hopper make a meal.

Jaffna and the Tamil north

Jaffna, at the northern tip of the island, is the capital of the mainly Tamil-speaking Northern Province, and its cooking differs from the south's. Its signature is Jaffna crab curry. Jaffna cooks make it with sea crab rather than mud crab, and the key is the local curry powder: a household blend of more than a dozen spices, among them fenugreek, cumin, turmeric and dried chilli, known for its heat. Coconut milk and tamarind go in after the powder, and the curry is eaten with rice and string hoppers, shell by shell.

The other dish to look for is odiyal kool, a seafood soup. Around them the Tamil dishes found across the island, dosai, idly and wadei, with sweets such as kesari and laddoo, complete the northern table.

Jaffna lies off the ten-day loop, so most visitors taste its food in Colombo. The Palmyrah restaurant at the Renuka City Hotel, 328 Galle Road in Colombo 3, has cooked Jaffna dishes since 1972: its signature list names Jaffna whole crab curry, odiyal kool, mutton paal poriyal, fried fish pittu and milk hoppers. It serves lunch from 12.00 to 2.30 pm and dinner from 7.00 to 10.30 pm daily, so it fits the first evening in Colombo or a lunch on day 10 before the flight.

One caution belongs here: the German Foreign Office advises against eating sea fish and seafood in Sri Lanka, citing ciguatera, a poisoning caused by fish. If you follow that advice, choose the Palmyrah's mutton paal poriyal over the crab and the soup.

• Crab curry: hotter and darker than the coconut curries of the south.
• Without seafood: mutton paal poriyal, from the same kitchen.
• Tamil breakfast: dosai, idly and wadei, in Jaffna or at a Tamil restaurant on the loop such as Balaji Dosai in Kandy.

How to order: spice, the right hand and the bill

Spice. Much Sri Lankan food is spicy, so say what you want when you order: ask for the food less spicy or mild, and ask which of the day's curries are the gentle ones. Dhal, kiri hodi and pumpkin curry are the usual safe ground, and much of a plate's heat sits in the sambols and in the fried red chilli that often comes with rice and curry, which you can leave aside. If you like heat, say so too.

Eating with your hand. Rice and curry, hoppers and crab curry are traditionally eaten with the fingers: mix a little rice with one curry at a time, gather it with the fingertips and push it into your mouth with the thumb. The Rough Guide to Sri Lanka puts the rule plainly: eat and shake hands with your right hand. Wash your hands before and after; if you would rather use a spoon and fork, ask for them.

How a meal arrives. At a rice-and-curry lunch the small dishes come together around the rice; at a buffet you serve rice first and the curries around it. Hoppers and string hoppers are ordered by number, and short eats come on a mixed plate.

The bill. Cafe and restaurant menus often quote prices before a service charge, so look for it on the bill before adding a tip. Carry small notes for stalls and small eateries.

• Less heat: leave the fried chilli and the sambol aside if a dish is still too hot.
• Cutlery: a spoon and fork are yours for the asking.
• Service charge: check the bill before tipping.

Breakfast, short eats, sweets and tea

Breakfast is where much of the island's rice-flour cooking lives. Besides hoppers and string hoppers, look for kiribath, milk rice usually eaten with lunu miris, which is served at auspicious moments and which some people eat on the first day of each month, and green gram, boiled mung beans with coconut and lunu miris, a popular breakfast. A guesthouse breakfast that offers a Sri Lankan option is often the best meal of the morning.

Short eats fill the afternoon. They are patties, cutlets, Chinese rolls, maalu paan (fish buns) and pastries, for evening tea or a quick breakfast and the kimbula bunis, a crocodile-shaped bun. Street carts add isso wadei, samosas, achcharu and manioc chips.

Sweets. The two desserts to look for are buffalo curd eaten with palm honey and the Malay-derived, caramel-like wattalapam. The Sinhalese festive sweets, kavum, kokis and aluwa, belong to celebrations.

Tea. The Export Development Board divides Sri Lanka's tea country into seven regions, among them Nuwara Eliya, Uva, Dimbula and Kandy, each with its own character in the cup. The tea exporters class them by height: low-grown tea, below 600 m, is dark and malty; high-grown tea, above 1,200 m, is light and golden, and Nuwara Eliya's is the palest of all. Ella is the loop's tea stop, and our Ella guide has the Uva factories; if you add Nuwara Eliya, our Nuwara Eliya guide has a factory tour and a terrace that pours teas from five regions.

Other drinks. A king coconut, thambili, from a roadside seller is a good drink on a hot day. Lion Lager and arrack, distilled from toddy, the fermented sap of the coconut flower, are the local alcohol.

• Breakfast: egg hoppers, string hoppers, kiribath or pittu.
• Afternoon: tea with a fish bun or a cutlet.
• Dessert: buffalo curd with palm honey, or wattalapam.

What a meal costs

Two restaurants on the loop print their prices, read on 27 October 2026. Cafe Chill on Wellawaya Road in Ella lists string hoppers or coconut roti with curry at LKR 1,700 at breakfast, rice and curry of the day with eight curries at LKR 1,700, or LKR 1,500 vegan, lamprais at LKR 1,950, devilled chicken with rice at LKR 1,600 and a pot of black tea at LKR 800, all before its 10% service charge. The Tranquil Trails restaurant at Lenawa, Kimbissa, near Sigiriya, a hotel restaurant whose menu does not say whether non-guests are served, lists egg kottu at LKR 2,000, chicken kottu at LKR 2,500 and a traditional rice and curry with one meat curry and three vegetable dishes at LKR 3,500. Small local eateries charge less than these two menus; the daily levels below are the trip-cost guide's.

These daily figures are the ones our trip-cost guide uses for its seven-day trip; it also prices the rooms, cars and tickets.

• Cheapest good meal: rice and curry at a local lunch place, or a plate of hoppers.
• Where the money goes: service charge, air conditioning and hotel dining rooms.
• Cash: small notes for stalls.

Meal by meal on the first-trip loop

This plan follows the ten-day loop: one night in Colombo, two in the Sigiriya area, two in Kandy, two in Ella and two in Galle, then the coast train back to Colombo for the flight on day 10.

• Colombo, the first evening: kottu or wade on Galle Face Green at sunset, or Jaffna cooking at the Palmyrah.
• Sigiriya area: rice and curry or kottu after the climb, at the Tranquil Trails restaurant at Lenawa, Kimbissa if you stay there; hoppers at your guesthouse in the morning.
• Kandy: string hoppers at Balaji Dosai from 7.00 AM; rice and curry at the Queen's Hotel's Main Restaurant beside the lake, lunch 12.00–3.00 pm; buffalo curd for dessert.
• Ella: string hoppers or coconut roti with curry at Cafe Chill, served 8:30–11:45 am, then lamprais or rice and curry for lunch; a pot of tea after the walk; kottu in town at night.
• Galle: a hopper breakfast on the Veranda at Amangalla on Church Street, and black pork curry at Church Street Social; our Galle guide has both.
• Day 10, Colombo: lunch at the Palmyrah, or short eats from a bakery for the road to the airport.

Poya days, vegetarian food and allergies

Poya days. Sri Lanka Tourism says the sale of alcohol, meat and fish is prohibited on full-moon poya days and some shops and businesses close. The festivals calendar lists the dates.

Vegetarian and vegan. Sri Lanka Tourism says visitors can have vegetarian, vegan or non-vegetarian meals, and the everyday curries include dhal, jackfruit, pumpkin, lotus stem and banana flower. Two things need a word when you order. Maldive fish, dried tuna, is often added to pol sambol, and egg turns up in hoppers, kottu and short eats. Balaji Dosai in Kandy is a vegetarian restaurant, and Cafe Chill marks a vegan version of its rice and curry.

Allergies. Coconut is in curries, sambols, hoppers and sweets; wheat is in kottu, roti and short eats; and prawn, crab and Maldive fish can sit in dishes whose names do not mention them. If you have an allergy, name it before you order.

Water. Do not drink tap water; our first-trip guide has the rest of the health advice.

• Vegetarian: ask for no Maldive fish in the sambol.
• Water: bottled, its seal broken in front of you.