Sri Lankan Roasted Curry Powder
The Quirky Foodster Team
Ingredients
- Coriander seed — 1/2 cup
- Cumin seed — 3 tbsp
- Fennel seed — 2 tbsp
- Fenugreek seed — 1 tbsp
- Dried red chiles — 8-10
- Cinnamon stick — 1
- Cloves — 4-5
- Green cardamom pods — 4-5
- Curry leaves and pandan leaf pieces — a few
Method
- Dry-roast each spice group separately (chiles and curry/pandan leaves first, as they roast fastest, then the seed spices) until deeply dark brown — significantly darker than most South Asian curry powders — then cool and grind.
- THE defining step of this blend — Sri Lankan curry powder is roasted to a notably darker, almost black-brown stage than Indian curry powders, giving it a distinctive smoky-bitter depth.
Origin: Sri Lanka — the island’s signature dark, deeply roasted curry powder, distinct in color and flavor from most Indian curry powders.
Use: Added during the cooking of rich, dark meat curries.
Classic Dishes: Sri Lankan black pork curry; various meat curries calling specifically for the roasted style.
Storage: Keeps 3-4 months sealed and dark.
Variations: The roasted style and its unroasted counterpart (Sri Lankan Unroasted Curry Powder) represent genuinely distinct flavor directions within Sri Lankan cooking, chosen deliberately by cooks depending on the dish, rather than one being simply a ‘better’ version of the other.
Substitutions: A dark-toasted version of standard Indian curry powder, toasted further at home, approximates the effect.
- Coriander seed — 1/2 cup
- Cumin seed — 3 tbsp
- Fennel seed — 2 tbsp
- Fenugreek seed — 1 tbsp
- Dried red chiles — 8-10
- Cinnamon stick — 1
- Cloves — 4-5
- Green cardamom pods — 4-5
- Curry leaves and pandan leaf pieces — a few
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