Sri Lankan Desserts

If you still have room for dessert after all delicious Lankan food, go for a cup of curd topped with treacle or try Wattalappam - a rich pudding made with Jaggery, fudge from the Kitul palm treacle. If you're battling the bulge, you can still choose from a mouth-watering range of fresh tropical fruits that will really give you a feel of the tropics. Try perennials like papaya, pineapple, several varieties of mangoes, passion fruit, and over a dozen varieties of bananas. Or go for the unusual - pearly white Mangosteen in its purple husk, Rambutan, Sapodilla. Soursap, Guava, Beli, Varaka and Durian.

While you are here, don't just ask for fruit juice. Tambili ( King Coconut juice ) drunk straight from the golden fruit, the delicate Kurumba, the crushed pink rice of water - melon juice, passion fruit juice, orange, pineapple, papaya - take your pick.

One of the most delicious Sri Lankan desserts is milk rice which is also called imbul kiri bath and consists of finely scraped coconut, treacle, cloves, pinch or salt, coconut milk, white rice, and water. But this does not mean that it cannot be compared with other tasty desserts like aluwa, a rich fish curry meal served with black coffee which is made from sugar, butter, milk, mashed potatoes, cashew nuts, rose water, and ground cardamom; avocado crazy, containing avocados, sugar, and cream dash of rum; bibikkan, consisting of semolina, honey, raisins, flour, cashew nuts, coconut, butter, sugar, lime, vanilla, cardamom, rose water, cinnamon, dates, sultanas, ginger preserves, chow-chow and any other fruit you like; wattilappam, which consists of eggs, coconut milk, jaggery, cardamom, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt; mung kavum, which, in order to be prepared, requires rice flour, mung flour, coconut or kithul treacle, butter, vegetable oil, salt, coconut milk, eggs and turmenic; rulang aluwa, containing semolina, sugar, powdered cardamom, powdered cloves, and chopped cashews; weli thalapa for which you need rice flour, coconut milk, kithul or coconut trealce, and salt; love cake with semolina, butter, sugar, cashew nuts, pumpkin preserve, eggs, rose essence, almond essence, brandy, honey, oil paper, cardamom, cloves cinnamon, nutmeg and lime rind. The most traditional Sri Lankan dessert is kiri pani or yoghurt and treacle.