Southern Recipes

Parippu

Sri Lankan Dhal Curry

Dhal curry is the dish Sri Lankan families cook most. At home we call it parippu. You simmer small red lentils until they turn soft and creamy, then stir coconut milk through them. Last of all you fry onion, garlic, mustard seeds and curry leaves in hot oil and tip the whole sizzling panful on top. That last bit is called the temper, and it is the part that makes everyone look up. If you only ever learn one Sri Lankan recipe, learn this one. You will see the name spelled dhal, dal or daal. It is all the same bowl.

Pol Sambola

Pol Sambol

Pol sambol is freshly grated coconut pounded with red chilli, lime, onion and a little Maldive fish. You might know it as coconut sambol or Sri Lankan coconut relish, but it is the same thing: bright red, fiercely hot and ready in ten minutes flat, with not a single pan involved. Smeared on bread, piled onto hoppers or spooned next to rice and dhal, it goes with absolutely everything.

Malu Curry

Sri Lankan Fish Curry

This is malu curry, and malu simply means fish. Firm white fish simmered in a roasted-spice and coconut gravy, soured with goraka (Malabar tamarind) rather than lime, so the tang comes out dark and deep, not bright and fruity. Pick a firm fish and the chunks stay meaty and hold together in a gravy that clings to every last piece.

Wambatu Moju

Eggplant Moju

Wambatu moju, or eggplant moju, or brinjal moju, is fried eggplant tossed in a sweet, sour and spicy pickle of mustard, vinegar, chilli and sugar, with fried onion and green chilli. It's sticky, tangy and a little fiery. This Sri Lankan brinjal pickle shows up on festive tables and keeps for days, and the flavour only gets better.

Maalu Ambul Thiyal

Ambul Thiyal

Ambul thiyal, Sri Lanka's celebrated sour fish curry, is firm cubes of fish slow-cooked in a thick, dark paste of goraka (dried garcinia), black pepper and spices until almost dry. It's tangy, intensely peppery and glossy black, and it comes from the southern coast, where the sour goraka was originally used to preserve the catch so it would keep for days without a fridge. Also called maalu ambul thiyal, it is one of the island's great seafood dishes.

Kalu Dodol

Kalu dodol is the black coconut sweet, and yes, it earns the name. Thick coconut milk, kithul jaggery and rice flour go into a pan and cook down low and slow for a couple of hours. You stir the whole time, no stopping, until the coconut oil separates out and the mass turns dark, glossy and almost black. It's dense, chewy and deeply caramelised, like toffee with warm cardamom and little nuggets of cashew. Kalu means black, and the colour is your reward for patience. You don't make kalu dodol from a recipe so much as from an hour or two of steady stirring until it tells you it's done.