Mani Pittu | Mani Puttu | Srilankan Pittu | Breakfast Recipe

Mani Pittu, a Sri lankan steamed breakfast recipe made from rice flour. Few months back, when i chose Srilankan recipe for BM, this recipe caught my attention. 

Actually it's not a new recipe to any Indians at least  to South Indians, it's like a combination of idiyappam, puttu and kozhukattai, Yes, three in one recipe. 

My idiyappam and puttu collections in the blog tells you that how much i like them both, so without a second thought i had given this recipe a try on the every next day and I really love the way this putt/pittu is being made. 

Though it involves a lot of labor & time, i really enjoy the process of making this pittu and of course enjoy eating it too!!!
  
In Sri lanka , this puttu is mainly served as breakfast and in sometimes served as dinner also. Usually this pittu is served along with linu mirus or/and coconut milk or simply with sugar.

I have chosen the easy one and served it with sugar and it tastes absolutely delicious. By looking at the ingredients, you knew it sounds exactly like our idiyappam, but what make this interesting is how it's been made !!! Before check out the recipe, if you like to know what i have shared on the yesterday under International Breakfast, here it is 
Day 1 - Mysore Masala Dosa from India

Mani Pittu

Preparation Time : 20 mins | Cooking Time : 15 mins | Serves : 2 
Recipe Category: Breakfast | Recipe Cuisine: Srilanka

Ingredients
Rice Flour - 1 cup
Water - 3/4 cup
Sesame Oil - 1 tsp
Salt - to taste
Grated Coconut - as needed

Procedure

First heat the water in a sauce pan along with salt and oil.

When the water comes to boil, switch off the flame and remove from heat. Measure & take the flour in a bowl,add the water little by little into the flour.

Mix it with spatula gently until all comes together. Now take the idiyappam maker, take a log of dough and add into the idiyappam maker, close it with lid and keep it ready.

Here in this recipe, i have used the disc with small holes as shown in below image. Take a sheet of paper and place it on the working area, place the sieve on top of that paper.

Sprinkle rice flour generously on the sieve, then squeeze the idiyappam maker, when the string reaches about 1/2 to 1 inch length, stop squeezing and shake the idiyappam maker, the strings falls in to the rice flour. Similarly do it two or three times, make sure that the strings should spread evenly on the sieve.

Now sprinkle little extra rice flour on the top and then lift the sieve & gently tap on the sides of the sieve to remove the excess flour. 

Transfer the strings into the plate. Do the same for the remaining dough. Now to make the mani pittu, take the grated coconut.

In a puttu maker, add the disc and then the grated coconut.

Gently take a 2 or 3 handful of rice strings and add into the puttu maker. Again add the coconut. Repeat the steps and finish off with the coconut on the top.

Close the puttu maker with lid and steam it for 5-7 mins and then gently remove the pittu with the stick that comes along with puttu maker.

Tada, Mani Puttu is ready. Sprinkle some sugar and serve.

Related: How to make Srilankan Chicken Curry

Notes:

• Depends on the flour quality, you may need more or less water,so always boil extra 1/4 of water.
• Add water little by little  into flour. If you add more water, then the rice string would be sticky and the pittu would be clump together. 
• Sesame oil gives wonderful aroma to the pittu
• Though the strings are non-sticky, after cooking, it all stick together and come as single pittu(like our regular puttu)from the puttu maker, again when you touch, each string comes off separately.
• Be generous while sprinkle rice flour on the string, otherwise it stick together.
• Depends on the size of your sieve, squeeze the strings in batch and also squeeze evenly on the entire sieve, don't squeeze on one place, it easily clumps together.
  

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Srilankan Chicken Curry | Chicken Curry | Chicken Gravy

Srilankan Chicken Curry, an another famous recipe from the Srilanka. When comes to different cuisine, i'm always reluctant to try except few, Srilankan cuisine falls to that expectation category :-). 

Since the ingredients used in their cuisine are almost same as of my everyday cooking and i knew how it would tastes, hence i'm quite comfortable in give it a try. When i browsed through the Srilankan recipe, i noticed that their recipes are almost similar to south Indian recipes especially south Tamilnadu and Kerala!!!

As I said in my previous pol roti post, this curry is one such delicious side dish for roti and rice. The ingredients that go into that curry powder gives the curry a wonderful aroma and taste to the curry. The flavor from the coconut oil, coconut milk along with the curry powder takes this dish to a whole new level and wanting you to eat more & more(personal experience), it's really hard to stop !!!

In this recipe, tamarind is used to marinate the chicken instead of curd. Normally we use curd or tomato for tanginess when it comes to non veg dishes except fish, so i wondered how chicken would taste in tamarind base, honestly it's not at all overpowering  & the slight sweet from the tamarind goes well with chicken. 

I'm sure that from now on, this will be a regular dish in my home !!! For vegetarians, try the same with yellow pumpkin. After I had prepared my own Curry powder, I tried  the same curry with pumpkin instead of chicken and it turned out so delicious. ST normally doesn't like any pumpkin curry, but he also liked this very much. Ok, enough with the stories, now let's check out the recipe.

Srilankan Chicken Curry

Preparation Time : 30 mins | Cooking Time : 20 mins | Serves : 2 
Recipe Category: Curry | Recipe Cuisine: Srilankan
Srilankan Chicken Curry, Chicken Curry, Ceylon Chicken Curry Srilankan Chicken Curry, a delicious and flovurful chicken curry made with curry powder and coocnut milk.

Sandhiya https://www.facebook.com/SandhiyasCookbook https://www.instagram.com/sandhiyascookbook/

Ingredients
Chicken - 1/2 lb
Tamarind - a gooseberry size
Onion - 1/2
Tomato - 1 small
Green chili - 2
Ginger - 1 inch piece
Garlic - 4 cloves
Curry leaves - few
Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
Red chili powder - 1/2 tsp
Srilankan Curry powder - 1 & 1/2 tsp
Homemade Coconut milk - 1/2 cup 
To Temper
Coconut oil - 1 tbsp
Cinnamon - 1/2 inch piece
Cloves - 2
Cardamom -2

Procedure

First soak the tamarind in 1/4 cup of water for 30 mins, clean the chicken and wash it with turmeric powder and keep it ready.
Extract the tamarind juice from the soaked tamarind and add the chicken & salt and mix it well. Let it soak for 30 mins, in the mean time, cut the onion into thin slices, tomato into small pieces, slit the chili and thinly slice the garlic and ginger and keep everything ready.

Heat the pressure cooker add  the coconut oil and the tempering ingredients. Let it fry in oil for 30 secs.

Add the onions,ginger,garlic, green chili & curry leaves and saute till the onions becomes translucent and then add the tomatoes & give a good mix.

Add the chicken along with the tamarind juice and then add turmeric & chili powder.

Add the srilankan curry powder & enough water,mix it all well together and cook it for 3 whistle.

Once the pressure is released from the cooker, open the lid ,put it on low flame and then add the salt (remember we already added the salt while marinating the chicken,so this is for curry only )& coconut milk.

Let it simmer for 10 mins in the medium flame & switch off the flame.

Tada, Srilanka Chicken Curry is  ready. Serve it with roti or rice.

Related : How to make Pol Roti / Srilankan Coconut Roti

Related : How to make  Srilankan Curry powder

Notes:

• If you have tamarind paste, use 1 &1/2 to 2 tsp instead of tamarind.
• After adding the coconut milk, keep the flame in low to prevent curdling.
• Freshly grounded srilankan curry powder gives great flavor to the curry but you can use the store bought curry powder also
• Use bone meat for best flavor.
• If you're using store brought srilankan curry powder, depends on the spice level of curry powder, adjust the amount of red chili powder. Many store brought powder have added the red chili too.
• I have used home made coconut milk, but you can use store brought also.
  

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Pol Roti | Srilankan Coconut Roti | Coconut Roti Recipe

Pol Roti/ Srilankan Coconut Roti, a delicious roti from the little island of Srilanka, made from flour and freshly grated coconut. When I searched for Srilankan recipes, this pol roti was my first choice to give it a try! 

By knowing the ingredients itself, I knew that it would be my kind of roti. Generally I love any dish with coconut, so there is no surprise that I liked this roti too.

Adding coconut gives a unique texture to the roti, they are crispy on the outside because of coconut and soft inside. And also I came to know that these rotis are usually served with Srilankan chicken curry (which i will share tomorrow), hence i too tried the same way.

Pol roti with chicken curry and onion sambol  is one of the most delicious combinations i have tried so far, trust me on this, you have to try this combination.

 For vegetarians, instead of chicken, you can try the pumpkin curry in the same way and have it as a side dish or I guess even it would be delicious with any Indian curry too. Those who like coconut flavor and looking for different roti recipes, definitely give it a try. 

Pol Roti/Srilankan Coconut Roti

Preparation Time : 5 mins | Cooking Time : 15 mins | Makes : 10 small rotis 
Recipe Category: Roti | Recipe Cuisine: Srilankan
Pol Roti, Srilankan Coconut Roti,Coconut Roti, Ceylon Coconut Roti Pol Roti/ Srilankan Coconut Roti, a delicious roti from the little island Srilanka, made from flour and freshly grated coconut.

Sandhiya https://www.facebook.com/SandhiyasCookbook https://www.instagram.com/sandhiyascookbook/

Ingredients
All Purpose flour - 1 cup
Grated Coconut - 3/4 cup
Salt - to taste
Water - as needed 
Coconut oil - as needed

Procedure

Take the flour in a bowl, add coconut and salt into it.

Mix it with your hands until all the moisture from the coconut incorporated into the flour, then add the water little by little and make a soft pilable  dough.

Divide the dough into equal size balls, roll the dough into thick disc with rolling pin and use any lid/cutter & cut into neat round shape.

Heat the tava and drizzle some coconut oil and place the rolled dough . Cook it both sides on medium flame until the brown spots appears on them.Remove them on the plate. Repeat the same for the remaining dough.

That's it, your delicious Pol Roti is ready. Serve it with Srilankan chicken curry & onion sambol.

Related: How to make Srilankan Curry Powder 

Notes:

• Depends on the moisture in the coconut, it may need more or less water, so first mix dough and coconut well before adding water into the flour.
• Freshly grated coconut gives so much flavor to this roti, so i highly recommend to use freshly grated coconut.
• No need to rest the dough for this roti, once the dough is prepared, immediately you can roll them and make rotis.
  

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Lavariya | Srilankan Sweet Dumpling | Sweet Recipe

Lavariya, a Srilankan sweet dumpling which is  made from the sweet coconut stuffing wrapped by the lacey rice flour outer layer. When i was browsing for Srilankan recipe, this lavariya(nice name for a recipe, right?) recipe caught my attention. 

It's like our poornam kozhukattai(modak) in an artistic way or we can say it's a merger of idiyappam and kozhukattai. Whatever it is, I really love the way it's made . So far, I have prepared this twice in the past 15 days, now you know how much I like this. They are so fun to make and most importantly it's absolutely delicious !!!

The basic recipe of the filing has been made with coconut & jaggery and flavored with cardamom powder. But I had seen a lot of recipes using cooked moong dal in addition to the coconut, so I tried both ways and liked them. Hence you can try this lavariya with moong dal stuffing or as simple as coconut stuffing.

The recipe that I'm sharing here has moong dal in it, but as said before, it's purely optional. And one more thing to mention here is that if you're making this for the first time, definitely it is gonna take a lot of time for shaping this lavariya,but I guess with little practice, it can be done in much less time.

Lavariya

Preparation Time : 1 hr | Cooking Time : 20 mins | Makes : 6-8 
Recipe Category: Sweet | Recipe Cuisine: Srilankan
Lavariya, Srilankan Sweet Dumpling, Srilankan Sweet Lavariya, a Srilankan sweet dumpling which is made from the sweet coconut stuffing wrapped by the lacey rice flour outer layer.

Sandhiya https://www.facebook.com/SandhiyasCookbook https://www.instagram.com/sandhiyascookbook/

Ingredients
For dough
Rice Flour - 1 cup
Water - 3/4 cup
Sesame Oil - 1 tsp
Salt - to taste
For filling
Grated Coconut - 1/2 cup
Moong dal - 3 tbsp
Jaggery - 1/2 cup
Cardamon - 2

Procedure

First let's make the filling.
Soak moong dal for 30 mins, then add into pan along with enough water, bring into boil.

Close the pan with lid and cook till dal is soft. If you press the dal between your fore finger and thumb, it should be mashed, that's the correct stage.

Drain the extra water and keep it aside, in a pan add the jaggery and water just enough to immerse the jaggery.

Let the jaggery melts completely, drain the jaggery syrup and discard the impurities. Pour the syrup again into the pan and turn on the heat.

Add the grated coconut, cooked dal and crushed cardamom.

Let it cook until all comes together as a thick mass. Turn the heat off and let it cool.

Now for the outer filling,heat the water in a sauce pan along with salt and oil.

Let the water comes to boil, switch off the flame and immediately pour into the measured flour.

Mix it with spatula vigorously until all comes together. Now take the idiyappam maker, take a log of dough and add into the idiyappam maker.

Take a piece of banana leaf/butter paper and squeeze the dough into concentric circle just like idiyappam, then place a tbsp of  filling in the center.

Now gently fold the banana leaf so that the outer layer covers the inner filling. Now hold the banana leaf on both sides and gently roll it from one side to other side for few times, it helps the dough to stick together and form a cylinder shape. 

Place it on the greased steamer plate and steam it for 6-8 mins.

Tada, Tasty Lavariya is ready. Serve it with a cup of tea. 

Related: How to make Srilankan Mani Pittu

Notes:

• While shaping the lavariya, be gentle, otherwise the string would merge and you can't see the lace like texture on the outside
• You can vary the proportion of moong dal and coconut as per your liking.
• Taste best when it's hot.
• You can cook the dal in pressure cooker too, but make sure that it doesn't turn into mushy.

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