1. Hoppers (Appa)

A hopper is a bowl-shaped pancake made from a fermented rice-flour and coconut-milk batter, crisp at the lace-thin edges and soft in the centre. The egg hopper, with an egg cooked into the well, is the version most travellers meet first. Hoppers are usually eaten at breakfast and dinner rather than lunch, and they are best taken straight from the pan, with lunu miris (a sharp onion and chilli relish) on the side. A small kitchen with a single hot clay pan and a short queue is a better guide than any menu.

2. Kiribath (Milk Rice)

Rice cooked slowly in coconut milk, pressed flat and cut into diamonds. Kiribath is the dish of beginnings in Sri Lanka: it marks the New Year, birthdays, new jobs and the first of the month in many homes. It is usually served with lunu miris, whose heat cuts the richness, or with a piece of jaggery for a sweeter plate. It is simple food made with care, and it says a good deal about how the island treats its occasions.

3. String Hoppers (Idiyappam)

Rice-flour dough pressed into fine noodles, steamed into small flat nests and served with a thin coconut gravy called sodhi, a dhal curry and a coconut sambol. The texture is delicate and the flavour is gentle, which makes string hoppers a good first Sri Lankan breakfast for anyone not ready for chilli at seven in the morning. Ask for them fresh; they stiffen quickly as they cool.

4. Rice and Curry

This is the centre of the table, and it is not one dish. A proper rice and curry arrives as rice surrounded by several small preparations: a dhal, a vegetable or two such as pumpkin, beetroot or jackfruit, a fish or chicken curry, a mallung of finely chopped greens with coconut, a sambol and a papadam. The skill is in the balance between them. The best versions are cooked in village kitchens and family-run guesthouses, often over a wood fire, and a home-cooked lunch with a host who explains each dish teaches more than any restaurant meal. Eat with your right hand if you are invited to, mixing a little of each curry into the rice as you go.

5. Kottu Roti

Flat godamba roti is chopped on a hot griddle with vegetables, egg, spices and, if you wish, chicken, beef or seafood, using two metal blades that ring against the steel. You will often hear a kottu stall before you see it. It is an evening street food, loud, hot and filling, and it is better eaten where the cook is working at speed than somewhere that holds it warm. Vegetable kottu is easy to find and entirely respectable.

6. Lamprais

A dish with Dutch Burgher roots: rice cooked in stock, a meat curry, a frikkadel (a spiced meatball), a hot relish and a sweet-sour onion preparation, wrapped in a banana leaf and baked so the flavours settle into one another. The name comes from the Dutch for a lump of rice. Lamprais is most closely associated with Colombo, and good ones are often made in batches, so ordering ahead or arriving early is sensible. Unwrapping the leaf is part of the pleasure.

7. Ambul Thiyal (Sour Fish Curry)

A dry, dark curry of firm fish, usually tuna, cooked with black pepper, garlic and goraka, a sour dried fruit that gives the dish its sharpness. It is associated with the south coast, and it was traditionally cooked in a way that let it keep for days. Eaten on the coast within sight of the boats that landed the fish, it is one of the most direct flavours on the island. It is not mild, and it is not meant to be.

8. Jaffna Crab Curry

The northern Tamil kitchen has its own character: roasted curry powders, tamarind, heat and a confident hand with seafood. Crab curry from the Jaffna tradition is the clearest example, thick, dark and generous with chilli, and not a dish to eat in a clean shirt. Travellers who include the north in their route are rewarded with a cuisine that is quite different from the south, and one that many itineraries never reach. If you cannot travel north, ask a trusted guide where a faithful version is cooked elsewhere.

9. Buffalo Curd with Kithul Treacle

Thick buffalo-milk curd, set in a clay pot until it is dense and slightly tart, poured over with dark treacle from the kithul palm. It is eaten as a dessert or a late breakfast, and it is one of the finest things on the island for the price of a few coins. The clay pot matters: it draws moisture from the curd and gives it a firmer set. Look for it on roadsides in the south and in the dry zone, and buy it from stalls where the pots are stacked and the turnover is quick.

10. Watalappan

A steamed custard of coconut milk, jaggery, eggs, cardamom, nutmeg and cashews, with roots in the island’s Muslim community and a place at celebrations such as Eid. It is dense, smooth and fragrant, and it is the dessert that ends a good rice and curry lunch properly. If it is on a home menu or a small restaurant counter, order it without asking what else is available.