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Coconut Roti

Recipes, Sri Lankan Food · January 24, 2015

  • Pol Roti

I think I started loving pol roti this much only when I started living away from home. I guess that’s another one of those ‘distance makes the heart grown fonder’ incidents. These little roti’s are easy to make, except they take a bit of time with all the shaping and cooking. But they stays fresh in the fridge for about 4-5 days, so I would recommend making a big batch and keeping some for quick breakfasts before heading out to work.


Those most people make plain roti, my dad always loved to ask my mom to jazz it up with savory flavors like onions, chopped chilies and curry leaves. And obviously, that’s where this inspiration comes from too.

I love biting into some freshly made pol roti with all its flavor and charred bits and better half always gives a thumbs up for this!

Cast of Characters:

  • Plain flour
  • A bit of oil
  • 1 egg
  • Shredded coconut – I use around the same quantity as flour
  • Chopped green chilies
  • Chopped onions
  • Chopped curry leaves
  • Salt, chili flakes and water

Props:

  • A large bowl
  • A flat roti pan (ideally) or any flat frying pan
  • A plate

How to:

  • Basically just mix in all the listed ingredients listed above and knead it until it become a big ball of dough. You could cook a small piece on the pan and check for seasoning and adjust as you wish.
  • It’s a very forgiving recipe in terms of quantity as you can always add more flour if you put too much water and vice versa.
  • Separate the dough into gold ball size balls.
  • Lightly coat a flat plate with a layer of oil. Place a ball of roti on the plate and by using your palm,  shape them till they become flat disks. They can be of any thickness and size as you wish. I prefer mine to be small and thin as they cook faster and has more crisp edges.
  • Heat up the flat pan, and place the flat disks one by one. I sometimes use a larger pan and make a few roti’s at the same time.
  • Cook them on the flat pan till they are cooked through and becomes slightly golden with a few charred spots on one side and flip over and do the same. Repeat for all.

Sidekicks:

  • Since these are brimming with the flavors of the onions, curry leaves, green chilies and the spices, they are perfect by themselves or with a little dab of butter.
  • But we usually eat it with a yummy beef curry and a bit of Sri Lankan lunumiris.
Pol roti
Pol roti

Notes:

  • While writing this post I just thought how yummy it would be to add some fried bacon (Beef bacon in our case of course!) bits into the mixture to give it a really savory kick! Never tried it before but I bet it would be amazing!
  • Update: I recently made pol roti with chicken curry and lunumiris for dinner and decided to convert them into mini ‘pizzas’ or open faced sandwiched like below. Just slather some cream cheese, top with some spicy lunumiris, shredded curried chicken, few leaves of baby spinach and drizzle abit of gravy from the chicken curry and ta-da, you’ve an Sri Lankan inspired pizza. I can imagine this as a perfect ‘short-eat’ for cocktails or parties!

    Pol roti 'pizza'
    Pol roti ‘pizza’

Filed Under: Recipes, Sri Lankan Food

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Sunanda Ta says

    January 24, 2015 at 9:11 pm

    Su, Pol Roti, yet another traditional breakfast meal in itself is normally a poor man’s dish until recently when most local restaurants in Colombo started serving this as a quick takeaway snack fr tea time or around 5′ 0 clock craze for office leavers. Remember, I used to bring home in the evenings after work picking them up hot from from the “oven” in front of WTC in Colombo @ Ceylinco snack outlet wayside botique, just around 10 or 15 LKr a piece with lunumiris!
    Trdaitionally, pol roti aws made in a more frugal home kitchen on a broken clay pot placed on firewood lightly lit with medium heat, roti spread on a piece of banana leaf cut to shape and size to give the roti a non sticky crust and some flavour charachteristic of natural leafy stuff, “kehel kolay”!
    that burnt crusty look is just the right texture of a typical homemade pol roti, if you like the originality of the old firewood kitchen flame.
    it is almost telepathy when I too thought of asking you to be a bit craetive to stuff the roti with some meaty stuff in flake form like beef, fish, chicken or bacon (beef) or may be with some luxury of cheese slices on it!!!
    Carry on, great ideas! Ta

    Reply
  2. Dinukshi Bandaranayake says

    April 20, 2018 at 3:49 pm

    Hey does the mixture stay fresh in the fridge (not freezer) or do we have to make the actual roti & put in fridge? Please advise….

    Reply
    • Su says

      June 22, 2019 at 10:34 pm

      I usually cook the roti and keep them in the fridge. You can easily pop then in the oven to reheat in the morning.

      Reply

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