Strange foods

In Sri Lanka a frequently used ingredient is Maldive fish.  It is basically cured Tuna. It is made in the Maldive Islands.  An island quite close to the island of Sri Lanka.

This is a form of a dried fish. Processed by boiling, smoking and then sun drying.  This enables it to be kept unrefrigerated indefinitely.

It looks like petrified wood. It tastes like fish.

And it is usually used by flaking a some off, or pounding a piece in a mortar and pestle so that it looks like splinters.

You would think it is hard to eat, but once broken like this it actually melts in your mouth.

It is a popular addition to sambols and various vegetable dishes.

Easy stressfree cooking

Some friends of ours visited us yesterday from Brisbane. It was lovely to see them. They decided to come fly here for a visit on the spur of the moment.  Which is what life is all about.

I cooked dinner last night for all of.  I cooked a Beef curry, a sliced cabbage dish with dried shrimps and pototes with chillie and onion.  I cooked the whole meal from start to finish in roughly 45 minutes. 

It is not a hard thing to do.  But my friend was amazed that I was not stressed.  I think a key to that is, that I have my pantry and larder all organised and I know that I can put my hand on whatever I need instantly. 

I also never follow recipes.  I put a little of this and a little of that and therefore, my dishes are always different, not by intent but thats the way I cook.

I find it hard therefore, to write recipes for the classes, and sit there very carefully measuring ingredients before I write a recipe.

But basically, it doesn't matter what a recipe says, if you think you need to add something else, add a little bit of soy sauce, or little bit of vinegar or whatever takes your fancy and you think the curry/dish needs you should go for it. If it doesn't work, you know not to do it again. But experimenting is important.


I teach some dishs that are quick and easy, and that the whole meal and come together in less than an hour. 

I would love to hear what you have done !

Cutting Chicken for curries

My grandmother like all Sri Lankans loved to feed people. She also needed to have an abundance of food on the table. I remember once when we were in the kitchen together she was talking about cutting chicken.  At that time, you could only buy whole chickens, now, in modern Sri Lanka you can go to a supermarket and buy various special pieces for example:  breast, Maryland etc.

The servant was new, and did not know my grandmother's ways and had cut the chicken for the curry that day into 'wrong' pieces. One would ask,  'how could you cut the chicken the wrong way'.  Well apparently there is a 'right' way. And I have never forgotten it.

The way my grandmother cut the chicken was: the  breast is cut down the middle and then each half cut into two pieces. The back is cut into 4 pieces, each thigh cut into two at the joints, and wings cut into two at the joints. The back pieces and the wings are not counted as portions and she used to say a whole chicken only had 8 pieces. So, you can imagine how many chickens were used for a family dinner !  It is cut this way so that the spices can readily penetrate the meat. The neck and also the giblets were included in the curry to give extra flavour.

I very rarely cook a whole chicken for a curry now, preferring to use the breast, or if my daughter was coming for a meal I would cook drumsticks because they are her favourite. But if I do cook a whole chicken, I still calculate that each chicken has only got eight pieces.... Some habits are hard to let go.

Milk Toffee

A favourite sweet in any Sri Lankan home is Milk Toffee.  It looks like fudge. But much harder and is basically pure sugar. But what a treat!  Why don't you try and it and see what you think.

1 can Condensed Milk
25 ml Water
350 g Sugar
2 Cardamom pods husk removed - you only need the seeds
1 tsp Vanilla extract

Dissolve the condensed milk and water over a low heat. Add the sugar and continue to stir constantly until the mixture starts to crystallise and leave the sides of the pan. Crush the seeds of the Cardamom. Add the vanilla extract and the cardamoms into the pan and mix well.

Spread the mixture onto a buttered laminton pan and even out the top.  You will need to do this quickly before it starts setting and gets too sticky to move around.  When it is cool to touch mark the square shapes so it will be easy to cut through. Once cool cut and separate and store in an air tight jar.  For a different touch you can add a handful of chopped nuts.  Sri Lankans usually add Cashews.  You will do this with the Cardamoms and Vanilla.

Let me know how you go.

Eat, eat, eat !

Sri Lankans love to entertain. I am not talking about a big bash with loud music I am talking about how they just love to feed people.  Let me try and explain.

If you ever visit a Sri Lankan home it is very likely that after the first few social niceties have been in exchanged like 'hi how are you' 'come in' 'lovely to see you'. I would almost guarantee that the next question that will be asked is 'have you eaten' ? It is probably a direct translation from Sinhalese but it is a question that you will be asked.

Even if you swear on your mother's life that you have just had the biggest meal and you would not be able to eat a morsel I am here to tell that you that you will fail in your attempt to stop them from putting some sort of food in front of you.  At best some 'short eats' - which is equivalent to finger food or at the other end of the scale a full blown meal will be presented in the least possible time. Because you cannot let a visitor leave your house hungry and without being fed !

If you get to the stage of a full blown meal, you will probably need to have at least a second helping.  Your plate will be piled with food with the hostess hovering over you adding more to it with the constant 'eat, eat, eat' !!!

You can give no more joy to a Sri Lankan however rich or poor if you sit down to a meal with them. They will cook you the best meal that they are able to, with whatever ingredients they have and will feel so honoured that you have given them a chance to do this.

My children have been brought up in  Australia and I brought them up to be like this. They follow this ritual and it brings joy to my heart to see that they have not lost their heritage. However, I remember as a single parent with not much money to spare and trying to make ends meet I  would sparingly buy groceries that was needed for the week, to ensure that the kids were well fed. I came home one night after work and the curry that I had cooked for the nights dinner was gone ! I couldn't understand what had happened.  I called both kids thinking that they had put it somewhere else. But my son said to me, 'amma, my friends were over and I gave them something to eat'.  I was horrified, that was our dinner ! I said 'why on earth did you do that son, now what are we going to eat'?  And he said, 'you have always told us to feed anyone that comes to the house, my friends needed to be fed' ! I had no recourse. He had learnt his lesson well and we had baked beans on toast that night !

My heart and Soul

Cooking has been the very breath of me since I was about 7 years old.  I remember as a little child standing on a stool next to my grandmother as she cooked in Sri Lanka. I had lived the first few years of my life in England and had just returned to Sri Lanka and  to bond with my maternal grandmother. She was a beautiful woman who also had a patience of a saint. She also cooked like no other I have ever come across. 

When I say she 'cooked' I mean that she put the ingredients together to make the dish.  Long before she graced the kitchen the servant would have ground the ingredients, sliced and diced the vegetables, onions, garlic and chillies. Yes ! I did say chillies. Some dishes could easily have had 20 chillies per dish!    And the coconut scraped ready for the milk to be made. The rice would be washed and ready with the correct amount of water and my grandmother would then be told that everything was ready for her to cook.

There were two kitchens in most houses.  One the servants used and one the lady of the house used.  The one the servants used was an open hearth and clay pots were used in this kitchen. In the other kitchen was a gas stove, where only Pyrex dishes were used and cakes were baked. 

Once summoned when the ingredients were ready she would then go into the kitchen, place the pot of rice on the open hearth. She would then take the prepared ingredients and put a pinch of that, a handful of this and prepare the dishes. She would then put them on the stove, and stir as she tasted, added other ingredients, and whilst she was doing this she would talk to me and explain to me what she was doing, and why she was doing something. How to stir, how to wait till the 'correct' time before you put the coconut milk into something and so on and so on.

At the time I had no idea that my love for cooking was starting to kindle. That I was absorbing all those little tit bits that she was sharing. To this date each and every time I cook I think of my grandmother. Remember little things that she told me. Sometimes, I would try to cook something that I had eaten as a child and I have no idea how I 'knew' how to cook it but I intrinsically knew how to do it. Was it words I had heard so long ago ? Or is it my grandmother whispering in my ear ?