Breakfast from Rasa Raja Bojun (රස රජ බොජුන්)

Noticed these round roti from Rasa Raja Bojun and got a couple of them for breakfast along with some quail eggs. Texture of the roti was dense, somewhat bready and lightly salted. I liked them with the lentils and spiced coconut.

Sambal for the quail eggs didn't pack a lot of heat and had a tomato-y flavour to them.

Kotuwa, Wanderlust

Kotuwa (Level 1 Wanderlust Hotel, 2 Dickson Road, tel : +65 6970 7838) of Unlisted Collection is by Rishi Naleendra of the former Cheek By Jowl. They're Sri Lankan - or rather a modern interpretation of it.

A shout out here to the bespectacled Chinese dude/wait staff who was with us and explaining the food. Thank you for the patience, for being discreetly observant and brimming with enthusiasm. We were here for lunch on 15th April.

This drink was Sozo - green orange with sea salt. Tasted like 酸梅.

First item up was their mutton rolls - panko-ed, fried served with tamarind ketchup on the side.

Spiced, packed a bit of heat yet balanced enough that it did not mute the flavours of the minced mutton in them. Delicious with and without the tamarind ketchup.

Rice of the day was with ghee, cashews and fried onions. I liked this one much.

That's the egg hopper - hopper being what locals would call appam. How this differs from the street variety appear to be less fermentation in the rice flour used to make the pancake. Hence it was noticeably less tangy. Edges were crispy and the non crispy parts were...actually kinda small. The egg covered most of it. 

The menu described this as Jaffna duck curry which was cooked in a light coconut gravy. More accurately, according to me that is, it's a duck confit in a pretty intense gravy that reminded me of a complex and intensely flavoured black pepper sauce. Wouldn't think of it as light coconut gravy for sure. Nice. Those crispy leaves were also spiced.

Pol sambol - tangy and savoury shredded coconut. Reminded me of the sambol at Rasa Raja Bojun. 

The lychees pickled in mustard and apple cider were delicious. Tangy, sweet and spicy at the same time. 👍🏼

Hell these were great together with the ghee rice.

Tried their watalappam tart. I tasted coconut, jaggery and spices amid the strips of orange zest in there. The green stuff were bits of pistachio and the cream on top was had a sweet milky cardamom flavour which reminded me of kheer/payasam.

The menu described this as buffalo curd parfait. I kept thinking cheese curds for some reason, totally forgetting that the word 'curd' in Indian food refers to yoghurt. So after the first mouthful I remembered. I'd call it yoghurt kulfi - with crushed cashews and a very understated Kithul caramel.

Ended with a cold coffee - Sri Lankan styled according to the menu. Pretty thick, spiced, sweet and milky. I think this needs less ice. A lot less ice.

Rasa Raja Bojun (රස රජ බොජුන්), Tekka Food Centre

Little birds have recently brought information about Rasa Raja Bojun (#01-280 Tekka Market & Food Centre, 665 Buffalo Road), a Sri Lankan food stall sequestered in the heart of Tekka Food Centre and curiosity was piqued. This was our first experience with Sri Lankan food.

Got a platter of rice with a bunch of dishes on the side which looked good - some of which were new flavours for us.

Like the vegetal gotu kola sambol which was a pennywort salad with desiccated coconut. There's a bit of heat in it from the chillis. I thought it was delicious mixed with the rice. Not so different from furikake methinks. 

Cabbage poriyal is cabbage poriyal. 

Mango curry was awesome - sweet, lightly savoury and slightly spicy at the same time under all that tanginess. This was not creamy unlike those renditions we've had from Mango Tree and Tandoor. Whole mangoes were chopped and cooked in the curry. I know because I was slurping their meat off the seeds and also eating the skins. Nice this one. 👍🏼 

I had imagine this spiced desiccated coconut to be similar with serunding but this one didn't have any sweetness at all.

Pepper chicken was deliciously salty from that earthy brown sauce that's peppered with....well, pepper. Hahaha. It was a little greasy and the flavour was savoury and intense with heat from black pepper. 

Am impressed here. Will definitely come back again to try more of their dishes.