The cuisine of Sri Lanka consists of Rice and Curry (cooked rice with aromatic vegetable-, fish- or meat-sauce, spiced with typical Sri Lankan spices) as a main dish. These dishes are served for lunch as well as for dinner, sometimes also for breakfast. Normally these dishes are hot, but their piquancy gets adopted to the rest of the dishes.

Often for dinner a lighter alternative is chosen. The curry is then served together with Hoppers, String Hoppers or Roti instead of rice. String Hoppers are mode of rice-flour, water and salt and get shaped through a form with small perforations (similar to a noodle-machine) into fine bars (like noodles) and after that formed into small round flatbreads and damped.

Roti is a flatbread made from dough, Polrotti a bread made from flour, coconut-flakes and water, roasted in a flat pan. Hoppers are served not only for dinner, but also for breakfast. They are made of a dough consisting of rice-flour, coconut-milk and yeast. The borders mostly are crunchy, while the center is soft. Sometimes an egg is placed in the middle or additional coconut-flakes are inserted in order to obtain sweet hoppers (Jaggery Hopper).

The famous Kiribath (rice pudding) consists of rice cooked in coconut-milk. Normally this rice is served at ceremonies and eaten with Katta Sambal, a mixture of chili, onion, fish and lemons or with Jaggery Hoppers. Pittu is also served with Katta Sambal or Curry. Pittu is made of rice-flour, coconut-flakes and water, formed into small balls and damped in moulds.

Fruit is frequently being served as a dessert. Furthermore there is a special kind of yoghurt made from buffalo-milk and Watalappan, an egg pudding which gets a dark colour from adding jaggery. There is also Kevum (oil-cake), made of rice-flour and syrup and fried in a pan. Aggala is a mixture of roasted rice-flour and syrup with a little pepper, kneaded into small balls. Aluva is a mixture of roasted rice-flour, coconut-syrup and a few other ingredients (which mostly remain family secrets…).

The recipes contain a lot of traditional knowledge of healing and the correlation in the organism. Spices are therefore used beyond their tasteful contribution for the regulation and relief of the digestion. Meantime also western science has confirmed the healing effects on the human body of many spices used in Sri Lanka.

The notorious piquancy of the dishes – mostly achieved by chilli – facilitates the blood circulation and eases the stay in a hot climate.