Kottu roti

Ingredients

• Roti or paratha — from the day before6
• Cooked chicken — shredded300 g
• Eggs3
• Onion1
• Leek1
• Carrot — julienned1
• Cabbage — shredded200 g
• Chicken curry with sauce200 ml
• Green chillies3
• Curry powder2 tsp
• Neutral oil4 tbsp
• Saltto taste

Salt and spices grow more slowly than the rest: doubling a dish does not double the pepper.

Weight converts to ounces and volume to cups. Grams of flour are not turned into cups, because that depends on how tightly it is packed.

Method

1. 1

   Cut the roti into centimetre strips: that makes the chopping easier later.

   6 min

2. 2

   Heat a large pan with the oil, fry the onion, leek and chilli two minutes, add the carrot and cabbage and cook three more.

   6 min

3. 3

   Push the vegetables aside, break the eggs into the cleared space, let them set and break them up.

   3 min

4. 4

   Add the chicken, curry powder and strips of roti and start chopping with two spatulas, mixing as you go. Three minutes of real work.

   4 min

5. 5

   Pour the curry sauce down the side and keep chopping a minute more. The mixture should be moist but not wet.

   3 min

About the dish

Kottu is made from yesterday's roti, and not out of thrift: fresh bread is too soft and mats into a lump under the blades instead of flying apart into strips.

Everything is chopped directly on the hot surface with two blades. The ring of metal on the griddle is part of the dish: in Sri Lanka a kottu stall is recognised by it from a street away.

The curry sauce goes in at the end and sparingly. Kottu must not be wet: the strips of bread have to stay separate rather than sticking into a mush.

Worth knowing

• — The pan should be large and flat. Chopping in a wok is awkward and the strips pile up in the middle.
• — Add the sauce a spoon at a time and taste. Kottu that is too dry can be fixed; kottu that is soaked cannot.
• — Godamba roti can be replaced by paratha or even a firm flatbread. A thin one disintegrates into crumbs.

Nutrition

Per serving at the base yield, calculated from the ingredients rather than measured in a lab.

Calories

640 kcal

Protein

32 g

Fat

28 g

Carbs

66 g

More from Sri Lanka

• Pol sambol — Fresh coconut pounded with chilli, onion and lime. Five minutes to make and served with everything.