Sri Lanka Food : Rice & Curry and other Foods Rice & Curry Rice & Curry is the main food of Sri Lanka and Sri Lankans enjoy some of the spiciest foods in the world. Meat, fish and vegetables are prepared as curries. Sliced onions, green chilies, black pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, nutmeg and saffron are used to add flavors. Today, rice and curry has shifted from being the popular breakfast to the essential lunch. A basic rice and curry requires one fish (or beef or chicken) curry, two different vegetables, one portion of fried crispy stuff like �papadam�, a �mallum� of chopped leaves and coconut, and a gravy or �hodda� of spiced and cooked with coconut milk. The rice is always put on to the plate first and then the curries are selected from the other dishes to mix with it so you have a collection of minor meals around the plate. You eat by mixing the rice with something forming it in to a bite-sized ball and consuming by hand. There is vast range of flavors and different curry mixes used for different foods. There are regional differences too. even with the same base food the taste will completely be different.  Hoppers Hoppers are much like sour-dough pancakes or muffins. The batter is fermented in the traditional way with a little palm toddy, which gives the hoppers a delicious liquor tang. The batter is left to rise overnight, then thinned with coconut cream and baked in a round cast-iron pan. The hopper has a soft, fluffy, well-risen center, a golden brown crisp border and is lightly flavored with a hint of palm toddy and sesame oil with which the pan is greased. An egg is sometimes baked into the center, sunny-side up. Hoppers are equally good with hot sambals a hot sharp 'relish' of ground chilies, grated coconut's shallots & cured fish or curries or with jam-the one rule is to eat them hot. String Hoppers  String hoppers are made from a hot-water dough of rice-meal pressed out in circlets from a string mould on to little wicker mats, then steamed. Light and lacy, string hoppers make a mouthwatering meal with curry and sambol. Pittu  Pittu probably came to Sri Lanka with the Malay regiments of the Eruption colonial period. It is however completely naturalized now and is a staple of Sri Lankan cuisine. Pittu is a mixture of fresh rice meal, every lightly roasted and mixed with fresh grated coconut, then steamed in a bamboo mould. It has a soft crumbly texture and is eaten with fresh coconut 'milk' and a hot chilli relish or curry.