Treasure island: an introduction to Sri Lankan cuisine

Eroshan came to the UK when he was just two years old, so his initial association with Sri Lanka only really came through his mother’s cooking. As he grew older the family would return to the island more often, and once he met his wife Aushi in Colombo (the capital city after which the restaurant is named), the two of them decided to open Kolamba and offer London a taste of authentic, homely Sri Lankan cooking.

‘I’d say around eight dishes that are on the menu right now come from home cooks rather than professional chefs,’ he says. ‘The fish cutlets are cooked using my own mother’s recipe. Everything we serve has been inspired by our trips around Sri Lanka and eating in people’s homes rather than what you’d find in restaurants, and I think that encompasses Sri Lankan flavours in their purest form.’

But what makes Sri Lankan flavours stand out against those found in India? A lot of it comes down to one ingredient: coconut. Despite being a relatively small island it’s the world’s fourth-largest exporter of coconuts, and they are integral to almost every aspect of the national cuisine. ‘We’re always compared to India when it comes to our food, but there are real differences between what we cook and eat compared to the rest of the subcontinent,’ says Eroshan. ‘We don’t use any animal fats in our cooking – no ghee, butter, cream or yoghurt – because coconut adds all the rich creaminess we need instead. We go through a couple of hundred coconuts a week here at the restaurant, so it’s the single most important ingredient.’

A lack of animal fat makes many of Sri Lanka’s vegetable dishes naturally vegan, but there are other aspects of the cuisine that make it stand out too. ‘Cutlets’ are one of the many small fried snacks known as ‘short eats’ in Sri Lanka, sold on street corners filled with all sorts of ingredients and an edible example of the island’s immigrant and colonial past. Pork is eaten much more commonly than in India, often in a ‘black’ curry with plenty of pepper. Few meals are complete without a sambol (or sambal) of some kind on the side, an intensely flavoured relish that can be added to dishes according to taste. And then there are of course the hoppers: lacy savoury pancakes not too dissimilar to dosas over the water in India.