Hoppers (appa or appam)

Hoppers (or appam) are the Sri Lankan answer to pancakes. Hoppers are sticky rice cakes made from fermented rice and coconut (also known as hoppers) with a thicker, spongy filling. They have an ethereal sweetness, lightly crunchy on the edge and soft in the middle.

Traditionally, the hopper is made by soaking rice overnight and grinding it into a fine powder with cooked rice, fresh coconut, or coconut milk. It is fermented by toddy (a crude palm wine). You can also use baking soda instead.

Hopper varieties are cooked in a special appam pan called appam chatti. They are not common in the US. However, they are available online at stores like Amazon. A ladle of batter is fried in a pan and swirled around so that the dough comes out evenly. Hopper can be sweet or savory. But one of the locals' favorites is eggs hopper. An egg is cracked into a bowl-shaped pancake, creating the Sri Lankan version of an "egg in a hole."

Eggs hopper are garnished with lunu miris, an onion, chili, lime juice, and salt. Unlike the flowing powder used for the hopper, the chain hopper is made from thicker powder. The dough is pressed through a hopper machine, like a noodle press, to create thin, steamed noodles.

String hoppers are usually eaten for breakfast or dinner with curries.