​Traveling isn’t just about seeing places and making new experiences, it’s also about trying out exotic food. Sri Lanka is ideal for anyone who wants to go on a culinary adventure. Not only does this tropical island woo visitors with rare fruits that look like a fantasy, it also offers vegetables you’re probably not familiar with (unless you’re from India). Here’s a look at 5 Sri Lankan vegetables begging to be tried.
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​No matter by which name it’s called – bitter gourd, bitter melon, bitter squash, bitter apple – everyone agrees on one thing: This vegetable is bitter. But not surprisingly, that also means it’s healthy. The bitter gourd looks somewhat like a misshapen cucumber or gourd with a green to yellow color and ridges all over it. Inside, you’ll find hard little seeds that are a whitish yellow and turn red when the vegetable is too ripe. It is believed that the bitter melon originates from the south of India (Kerala), and it’s found in almost all of Asia. There are two main ways Sri Lankans prepare their karawila, and you either love it or hate it. Some prefer cutting it into stripes/pieces and cooking it with tomato, spices, tamarind for something sour, and a dash of sugar to mask its bitterness. Others cut the vegetable into thin roundish slices and deep-fry them in coconut oil until their brownish and crispy. They’re then mixed with salt, pepper, finely chopped green chili and a sprinkle of lime to eat as a ‘salad’.
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​Do you call it brinjal? Or aubergine? Or eggplant? Some people argue that actually these aren’t synonyms but terms reserved for various kinds of the same vegetable, different in shape, size and color. For simplicity’s sake, let’s call it brinjal. This spongy vegetable with its longish shape, white inside studded with tiny, edible seeds, and purple skin color is a staple in Sri Lankan cuisine. Wambatu can be cooked with coconut milk and spices, tempered with some oil, garlic, onion, turmeric and curry leaves, or deep-fried and then prepared as a salad-like, sweet-and-sour batu moju with shallots, green chilies and optionally also tomatoes and pineapple pieces. The latter is a favorite for parties or meals that involve fried rice. Technically, brinjals are fruits (berries) but they’re treated as a vegetable. As soon as they’re cut, they need to be prepared because otherwise their white innards turn brown. To prevent that, the pieces can be kept in water or sprinkled with salt and/or turmeric. By the way, if you ever read the term ela batu, it’s a variation of aubergine that deserves the name ‘eggplant’ because it’s egg-shaped. It is mostly cooked as a spicy curry and carries a bitter undertone.
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The jack tree is – together with the coconut palm – the most important tree in Sri Lanka. People use its wood for furniture and its fruits as food. The jack tree is widely grown in South Asia and can yield up to 100 or 200 fruits a year. Its outward appearance makes the jackfruit look similar to breadfruit and durian, though the many small spikes aren’t sharp. The fruit can grow as big as bread loaves, greenish to yellow and heavy. An average fruit weighs several kilos and consists of 27% edible seed coat, 15% edible seeds, 20% white pulp and bark and 10% core. One needs to painstakingly remove its outer shell and then separate the edible pieces from its stringy, sticky white encasements.
​The almost unripe, tender jackfruit (baby jack) is called polos. The vegetable is chopped into chunks that are hard and white. It is usually slow-cooked for hours (preferably over a wooden fire) with lots of curry powder, goraka for sourness, garlic, onion and thick coconut milk. In the end, you have softish, brown pieces that look and feel a lot like fish or meat and have an intense, spicy taste. Ripe jackfruit, on the other hand, has softer, stickier innards of a pale yellow color. Called kos, it is either prepared as a mellum with grated coconut when it’s relative immature or boiled with lots of coconut milk, turmeric and garlic when it’s mature. Its mild taste is reminiscent of potatoes while the seeds are rather like roasted chestnuts. Overripe jackfruit goes by the name waraka and is more of a fruit. It has a strong smell not unlike durian, is bright yellow and has a rubber-like consistency as well as a sweetish taste. You eat it raw as a snack or dry and fry it to make ‘chips’.
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Called snake gourd or long gourd, this vegetable growing on a vine can reach stunning lengths of a few feet and look like a cross between cucumbers, bottle gourds and green snakes. To prepare pathola, you need to scrape off the whitish-greenish skin. Some cooks also half the vegetable and remove its white seeds. Long gourd is mostly enjoyed as a mild curry with coconut milk and not too many spices. Young plants that are lighter green in color and crispier can be sliced finely and eaten raw as a mellum with scraped coconut, green chili and onions.
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​Technically, this is an herb rather than a vegetable. It’s called Asiatic pennywort or centella and has even found its way to the American continent as part of alternative medicine and herbal tea. Sri Lankans love eating all sorts of greens and herbs, mostly as a sambol with scraped coconut, green chili and onion. Gotu kola is also used to make kola kenda, a sort of thick gruel-like soup or porridge that is enjoyed as a healthy drink (like a smoothie) in the morning. As such, it is pureed together with soft-boiled rice and coconut milk. The rounded leaves as well as the slender stems are edible, although care has to be taken to wash them thoroughly. This plant tends to grow in gardens, along the road and in wetlands as well as moist areas. It is indigenous to the Indian subcontinent.
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We are proud to announce that our hotel has been featured in an article in Sri Lanka's top travel and tourism magazine Travel Lanka, distributed to embassies around the world and offered at all tourist information centres.

​The Independence Day in Sri Lanka falls on the 4th February as the island nation gained Independence from the British on February 4, 1948 (one year after its neighbour India).

The pride-filled day is of course a national holiday (and in 2018, it falls on a Sunday). The island-wide celebrations encompass parades in the major cities, flag-hoisting ceremonies with prominent guests, dances and cultural performances by children as well as adults. Schools celebrate it (in advance) as well as institutions and companies. The main celebrations - during which the president raises the national flag and delivers a speech at a nationally televised event - take place in the capital, Colombo, though it may also be held in Kandy. The speech (delivered in Sinhalese as well as in Tamil) highlights the achievements of the government during the past year, raises important issues and pays tribute to the country's national heroes. A military parade is part of the annual celebrations.

It is interesting to note that Sri Lanka was not just a British colony going by the name of Ceylon but had previously also been colonized by the Portuguese (16th century) and the Dutch (17th century). To date, many traces remain, in the form of architecture - such as the Dutch Fort in Galle - as much as culture and food. Some people are of mixed heritage or carry a formerly Portuguese, Dutch or English name.

The British, notably, were the ones who introduced the cultivation of coffee and later of tea, making the small island in the Indian Ocean one of the world's biggest and best-known exporters of tea. Ceylon tea is still highly sought after. If you stay with us, it's not even a 15-minute drive to the Ceylon Tea Museum located in Hanthana as well as to tea factories. Alternatively, you can use Kandy as a starting point for a scenic train journey to Nuwara Eliya and Ella, famous for their mountains and lush tea plantations.
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Sure, fruits come in all shapes, colours and sizes – but have you ever seen a purple fruit? Well, how about the purple mangosteen (Garcinia mangostana). This tropical fruit comes from Indonesia and mostly grows in Southeast Asia. The tree is 6 to 25 m tall; the fruits reach the size of a tangerine or orange. Interestingly, the purple shell (sometimes with a reddish tinge, sometimes decidedly blue or almost black) is very thick. You usually don’t cut a mangosteen open, but apply pressure with your hands. If you squeeze it, the shell will break open to reveal its purplish inner skin and the actual edible fruit. Inside, there is a tight cluster of white fleshy fruit vesicles surrounding almond-shaped grey-brown seeds. You bite/suck the juicy, sweet and tangy, somewhat fibrous, fluid-filled vesicles and spit out the seed. The taste can’t really be compared with any other fruits. When you eat ripe mangosteens, beware of the shell’s juices as they leave stains on your fingers and clothes that are hard to wash out.

​Rambutan (Nephelium lappaceum) originates from the Indonesian and Malaysian region and is native to Southeast Asia. The evergreen tree can reach heights of 12 to 20 m. There are different kinds of rambutan, some with a sweeter taste and some more sour. The fruits are roundish single-seeded berries, 3 to 6 cm long and 3 to 4 cm broad. They grow in loose pendant clusters of 10 to 20 together. The leathery skin of the rambutan fruit has a red colour with orange or yellow undertones. The redder the fruit’s skin, the riper it is. It is covered with fleshy, pliable spines that look like funny hairs and aren’t particularly prickly. You peel or carefully cut the thin skin open to reveal the small olive-like ball inside. The fruit flesh is translucent whitish, with a sweet, mildly acidic to sour taste that sometimes reminds tourists of grapes or lychees. It surrounds a small greyish, inedible seed. Rambutan isn’t always in season in Sri Lanka – but you’ll know when it is, for the street stalls are usually overflowing with them during those times of the year. If you travel from Colombo to Kandy or vice versa, the road is lined with stalls selling ripe rambutan.
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​The jambu fruit – also called jambul or jamun in other countries – is native to the Indian subcontinent. Jambus (Syzygium cumini) are also grown in some Caribbean countries now (because they were introduced to the USA). Interestingly, jambu trees can live up to 100 years and reach growth heights of up to 20 m. They aren’t only grown for their delicious fruits but also because of their dense foliage and ornamental value. Many a Sri Lankan garden has a jambu tree for shade with a swing fixed to a branch or a bench beneath it. Jambu wood is water resistant, and its leaves can be used to feed livestock. The trees develop small flowers and then fruits that resemble large, oddly shaped berries. The jambu fruit is oblong or ovoid with a broader middle and bottom, and green in its unripe stage. As it ripens, the colour changes from whitish to pink, then to shining crimson red. The fruit has a very thin, edible skin with whitish flesh inside that reminds tourists of apples or pears. The taste is a combination of sweet, mildly sour and astringent flavours, though some fruits are rather watery and bland. Jambus tend to colour the tongue purple.
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Soursop (Annona muricata) is the fruit of a broad-leafed, flowering, evergreen tree. Sri Lankans call it annoda or katu annoda (due to its thorn-like protrusions). The fruits are light to dark green with a somewhat mango-shaped appearance and a prickly skin that can be peeled back with a knife to reveal the whitish flesh with its almond-shaped black seeds. The fruits are ovoid and can be up to 30 cm long. Their flesh – pulp with some fibre, tightly packed together in clusters – is juicy, acidic and aromatic, sometimes reminiscent of plain yogurt. The flavour of annoda can be described as a combination of pineapple and strawberry and with sour citrus undertone which contrasts with the fruit’s creamy texture (slightly like a coconut or banana). The pulp is used to make smoothies, fruit juice as well as candies, sorbets and ice cream. Soursop is sometimes called graviola and promoted as an alternative cancer treatment. There is, however, no medical evidence that it is effective.

​This tree (Limonia acidissima) is native to the Indian subcontinent but also grows elsewhere. It is sometimes called elephant apple instead of wood apple – for a good reason: Elephants will swallow the fruits whole and digest them over the course of days before the empty, hard yet porous and still intact shell leaves their bodies during defecation. Wood apple can reach a height of up to 9 m and has a rough, spiny bark. The fruit is technically a large berry with a diameter of 5 to 9 cm. Its flavour toes the line between sweet and sour with a woodsy to earthy undertone. Truth be told, wood apple is an acquired taste – but it’s hardly ever consumed like a normal fruit anyway. Instead, the fruits are used to make a fruit juice with astringent properties as well as pickles and jams. Its leaves are thought to have medicinal properties. The wood apple – called divul in Sri Lanka – has a very hard, brownish, white-spotted rind that can be difficult to crack open. Some people throw the fruits on the floor, others crack the shell open to free the sticky brown pulp and small white seeds.
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​The aluth avurudda (New Year in Sinhalese) adheres to a lunar calendar. According to Sinhalese astrology, the time when the sun moves from the house of Pisces to the house of Aries marks the New Year. It coincides with the end of the harvest season.

​In the weeks and days leading up to event, Sri Lankans will do their own form of ‘spring cleaning’. Houses and homes are repaired, renovated, refurbished and redecorated, vigorously cleaned and painted. People buy themselves and each other new clothes during special sales. Old grudges are forgiven, forgotten ties renewed. In modern times, however, some of these traditions have been forsaken and it seems that shopping for clothes and presents is now the most important thing. On the days preceding the New Year, traditional sweetmeats like kokis and kevum are prepared. These vary in Sinhalese and Tamil households, though many prepare sweets from both ethnicities.

​Almost everyone will take leave from work. Shops and offices close today or on the actual New Year day. The streets will be nearly deserted, although some people will use this last chance to run hurried errands or travel to their ancestral homes. On the last day of the old year, it is customary to bathe and to look at the moon at night.
 
Unlike the New Year celebrated all over the world according to the Gregorian calendar (with the old year ending on December 31st at midnight and the New Year dawning in the very next minute on January 1st), there is always a gap of a few hours between the end of the old year and the dawning of the new year. This time is called punya kalaya or nonagathe – neutral time – and is reserved for resting and fasting. For a certain amount of time, nobody will eat or drink anything (with the exception of infants, toddlers and sick people). Absolutely no form of work is allowed, be it housework or anything else. In the past – and still today in some villages and families – this time was used to socialize with the family and play traditional games, to listen to sermons and engage in religious activities or tell stories. Nowadays, everyone simply lazes around or is gathered around the television, as all stations will show live or pre-recorded programs pertaining to the New Year history and customs. Depending on the auspicious times each year, this time period might begin on the 13th and end on the 14th or cover several hours on the 14th itself.

​At a specific time declared by the responsible astrologers (all the dates and times are known weeks before the event already, so that everyone is prepared), the New Year dawns. People welcome it with fire crackers and cheering, sometimes also with the beating of drums. They wish each other and light oil lamps. It is customary for children – whether they are already adults or still young – to offer their parents betel leaves and worship them. The traditional wish in Sinhalese is “subha aluth avuruddak wewa”. After having wished the family and settled down, phone calls are made, and the ‘neutral time’ is broken.
 
Several minutes or hours after the dawning of the New Year, there is a specific time when to light a fire for the first time. Some choose the gas stove on which they cook, others prepare a fireplace out of stones and kindling. A clay pot is filled with milk and brought to boil over as an auspicious sign and symbol of prosperity. This is followed by enough time to prepare milk rice (kiribath) and condiments for the first meal of the New Year, with the first bite being taken at the preordained time. Often, the head of the household will feed the rest of the family a bite first. In many households, it is customary to go to the temple on the first day of the New Year.

​Following the main event, there are several other customs and ceremonies associated with the Sinhalese New Year. There is a day and time to bathe for the first time after being anointed with a special mix of oil and herbs/leaves. There is also a day and time when to first go to office or start business again. In the days leading up to this, people will visit close friends and distant relatives as well as go on trips.

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• For each important ceremony (welcoming the new year, lighting the hearth, breaking the fast, bathing, going to work), there is a designated auspicious colour to wear. It depends on the day on which the ceremony falls and could for example be white, gold, red, blue or green.
• Every time one of these rituals is performed, there is an auspicious direction to face (like north, east, etc.).
• For centuries now, Sri Lankans choose an avurudu kumariya, a New Year Princess. She has to look beautiful in traditional garments as well as know the customs and stand for respected values. This is done in schools and villages as well as at some workplaces and nationwide on the major television channels. An avurudu kumaraya is the New Year Prince, chosen in the same manner.
• In the days prior to and following the New Year, there are many games played on special grounds or in villages and at home. Some of them are: pillow fights on a horizontal beam, climbing a greased pole, eating dangling buns without using your hands, hitting filled hanging clay pots with your eyes closed, and sack hopping. Marathons, competitions and races are held before the festivities, with various (sponsored) prizes to win.

 
If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask us.