DestinAsian

BEARING FRUIT

In the central heartland of Sri Lanka, dining experience­s at three eco-friendly resorts connect guests with the soil and local culture.

- BY CAL WONG

Sri Lanka’s Cultural Triangle is known chiefly for the vestiges of its past—rock-cut temples, ruined palaces, and once-teeming capitals like Polonnaruw­a. But I am here on a mission to see how three local resorts are expressing the region’s culinary traditions with a dash of contempora­ry flair. KALUNDEWA RETREAT I start my journey an hour’s drive north of Kandy, in an area where ancient kings began to make their indelible mark on the landscape roughly 1,700 years ago. These ambitious rulers carved out huge man-made lakes to improve irrigation in an otherwise dry landscape. Over the centuries, farmers have utilized these lakes to water their crops and feed their families.

There’s a strong sense of that agricultur­al heritage at Kalundewa Retreat, a 42-hectare ecoresort in the shadow of its namesake mountain. More than 18 hectares are given over to farmlands, and most of the crops harvested here are organicall­y grown. These vary in the dry season, but come wet season, the farmlands are flooded with water from the surroundin­g lakes and turned into glistening paddy fields. On my visit, I help executive chef Shanil Gunasekera pick vegetables from the kitchen garden

— white eggplants, wrinkly bitter gourd, crisp cauliflowe­r—to prepare in his traditiona­l Sri Lankan degustatio­n. Gunasekera chooses his main ingredient­s according to the seasons, and I soon enjoy a dry curry of twice-cooked bitter gourd and tomato, yellow lentil coconut curry, and eggplant served two ways: sliced lengthwise to be cooked with chili and mustard seeds, and cut into delicate strips to be stir-fried with translucen­t cloves of garlic, onion, turmeric, and unroasted curry spices. Combined with a rich sunset-hued coconut sambal, it makes for a rustic, homey experience inside the property’s breezy Tree House restaurant. HERITANCE KANDALAMA Just beyond Kalundewa Mountain, chef Prasantha Giragama helms the sprawling, 374-squaremete­r kitchen at the Heritance Kandalama. I learn that Giragama cut his teeth here as a sous chef; after a successful stint in Australia as the executive chef at Canberra’s Crowne Plaza, he returned to Sri Lanka to lead the rotating roster of at least 75 chefs of all levels. Together they are tasked with feeding guests in the 150-odd rooms and five restaurant­s as well as The Cave, a table set in one of the natural grottoes located beside the greenery-draped hotel.

Special dining experience­s here aren’t just suited for romance; I get an inside look at the sheer scale of the hotel kitchen during a dinner at the chef’s table, amid a tiled setting flanked by stainless-steel counters and cooking stations. The first course comprises pan-fried lake prawns served with stewed tamarind, spices, and roasted garlic. What follows is the local staple kothu roti, or a traditiona­l flatbread stir-fried in a chicken curry gravy and served with a pungent but sweet combinatio­n of pickled young jackfruit, mustard seed, and red onion. I’m struck by how different this condiment tastes from a mature jackfruit. Next up, the desserts served by Giragama could easily be a meal on their own. I enjoy spoonfuls of Sri Lankan buffalo curd in kithul palm syrup, then a butterscot­ch-marinated starfruit and traditiona­l watalappan, or coconut custard pudding, and finally a rolled pancake “cigar” in a cardamom-spiced young coconut and sesame sauce. Giragama’s modern take on the classic flavors of Sri Lanka certainly packs a punch. SANTANI WELLNESS RETREAT Moving away from the lake-pocked plains around Kandalama, I head two hours south to Santani Wellness Retreat for a culinary experience rooted in Ayurvedic principles. A key element of Ayurveda is health through nutrition, and Santani’s commitment to holistic wellbeing extends to the personaliz­ed menus created for each guest over the course of their stay. These are determined by a private consultati­on and diagnosis by the resident Ayurvedic expert, Dr. Ravi Sooraj. “Unfortunat­ely, Ayurveda is treated like a fad now, and is applied in a patchwork manner,” he tells me. “When it doesn’t work, people criticize the entire system. If it is not applied in a holistic manner, then you won’t get holistic results.”

To develop a gourmet Ayurvedic menu, Dr. Sooraj works closely with Santani’s executive chef, Wajira Gamage, who spent 16 years in France honing his skills. This fortuitous pairing of doctor and chef is responsibl­e for the culinary creations at Santani, which incorporat­e the six tastes that should come with every meal: salty, sweet, sour, bitter, pungent, and astringent.

Meals at Santani are as delicious as they are nourishing. The relatively soft flavors of a green vegetable soup prepare me for the herby punch of the excellent grilled sea mullet that follows; this is balanced by the earthiness of a mushroom and quinoa risotto. A hibiscus jelly and citrus fruit salad caps off this light but satisfying meal. Santani’s digital-free environmen­t provides ample space for self-reflection, and by the end of my stay I feel healthy, balanced, and full of respect for the ways local chefs are showcasing the produce of the Sri Lankan soil.

 ??  ?? Above, from left: Grilled sea mullet, green vegetable broth, and hibiscus jelly with citrus salad at Santani Wellness Retreat; paddy fields below Kalundewa Mountain. Opposite,from left: Cooking for a Sri Lankan degustatio­n at Kalundewa Retreat; The Cave at Heritance Kandalama.
Above, from left: Grilled sea mullet, green vegetable broth, and hibiscus jelly with citrus salad at Santani Wellness Retreat; paddy fields below Kalundewa Mountain. Opposite,from left: Cooking for a Sri Lankan degustatio­n at Kalundewa Retreat; The Cave at Heritance Kandalama.
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