Month: July 2016

A Fresh Take on Sri Lankan Ingredients

Local, seasonal and seriously special is how you would describe Tri in Sri Lanka’s contemporary, creative dishes. Executive Chef Neil Wager put a lot into creating the eating and drinking at this unique Sri Lankan design hotel – from experiencing the close surroundings, the culture and the intense, magical feelings that come from visiting somewhere for the first time. Neil’s earliest thoughts and memories go back to meeting Rob on that first day and exploring the eco-minded boutique hotel when was still being built – first impressions last and his palpable recollections of the surroundings and smells, sights and tastes led to one of the most significant dishes on the menu, the beetroot curry (pictured)…

My first real Sri Lankan food experience is still a vivid memory, and this is what lead to our beetroot curry at Tri – from the plate we serve it on, to the dish itself. I had arrived the day before in Sri Lanka tired but excited. Collected from Colombo airport, a driver took me on the 2.5-hour journey to Rob’s house. It was the first time in the country for me and I was taking everything in. It was hot and humid, but I was so thrilled to be there.

As we left Rob and Lara’s villa on my first morning, as we drove to Tri for the first time I was taking in all around me, looking at the vendors at the side of the road and the food that I could see… Fresh fish laid out on wooden stalls, fresh papayas, rambutans, mangoes all stacked high, the beautiful gold king coconuts. We headed inland, and my senses were awoken more and more as we passed the colourful roadside scenes.

Following the back road to Tri, we talked about the many types of rice we could see being harvested and dried by the side of the road. This was different to any other rice I’d seen in its raw form in South-East Asia. I was set to discover a lot more from an older man I met later at Tri who explained that he had re-introduced old varietals of rice to the area. This gentleman who also recycles the waste at Tri organically grows 12 different types of heritage rice which are what we now incorporate into our menus.

Although Tri was a building site when I first visited, I could see lemongrass and cinnamon trees growing wild. I was free to walk around as Rob attended his daily site meeting. I strolled alongside the lakeside and encountered a huge monitor lizard – it made me appreciate the rawness of where I was. Talking to the builders on site they pointed out to me in broken English the plants they knew – hathawariya, polpala, gotukola, mukunuwenna and fresh curry leaves. Not knowing much about what these ingredients were yet, I took it all in and tasted everything I could, only to discover these make up the national soup dish kola kenda which I would then have made for me the following day for breakfast by the ladies who look after Rob’s house.

Sitting by the lakeside I was presented with a newspaper-wrapped lunch pack. Eating with my fingers I tried the real taste of a Sri Lankan curry for the first time – hot, slightly sweet beetroot curry, with mukunuwenna, smoky green bean sambal, earthy red rice, and a dhal so intense with flavour that this was in a sense a whole new cuisine to me. I sat on the edge of what is now the pool, my legs dangling over the top of an empty space, crumbled newspaper on my lap, watching the locals eat using their fingers to claw together the dhal as a binding ingredient to eat pieces of curry and rice in their hands – I copied them. As I sat there using my fingers, I had an incredible moment to myself, looking down tasting mukunuwenna, devouring the earthy, deep flavour, I could taste the healthy green elements going together. This gave me the vision of my first dish.

Later we met with a crockery designer, Ajit. Between us we designed a plate (see image featured) that reimagines that first plate of beetroot curry, it resembles crumbled folded out paper with unique markings, and the colours which are from the surrounding areas. Baking the beetroot first in cardamom salt, using fresh cardamom pods with our own sea salt sourced from the coast which is only 10 minutes away. Then there is a dhal puree, mukunwenna mallum, mukunuwenna a herb used in Ayurveda that grows along the road to the entrance to Tri – its simple, earthy flavours mixed with grated coconut is a natural delight. We turn this into a puree, blanching the natural herb then mixing it with a touch of agar we turn this into a liquid gel. This is a modern creation of cooking that gives a fluid sauce which is completely pure in taste. Many of the local ingredients we have manipulated the same way, deconstructing and reusing their simple flavours to give a modern contemporary tang and to create a unique cuisine for Tri. For texture I have made mukunuwenna jalebi – the jalebi is an Indian sort-of doughnut that that I use to create texture and a little bite to the dish.

All of the dishes we have created so far we take influences and touches of local ingredients, dishes and cooking techniques. We have even adapted sushi and sashimi to have Sri Lankan flavours. Ambu thiyal, black tuna curry with kiribath rice, we have adapted to nigiri sushi, the tuna belly is marinated in the black curry spice and seared, we lay this over the coconut red rice usually eaten with the dish, and you have a reinterpreted ambu thiyal, but the sushi we will go through in another blog post. Each day, as we learn more about the flavours and influences, we bring them into our cuisine, too. Every day at Tri is enlightening and inspiring.

Consultant Chef, Neil Wager, has almost three decades of experience working across nearly every continent from the Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach at an early age to London, Cornwall, and St Lucia. Time at the Dorchester Hotel and the iconic Quaglino’s was followed by spells in Thailand and Australia then high-end sporting occasions around the world (including 163 International Formula 1 Grand Prix and International PGA events). Career highlights have included co-writing Everyday Novelli, developing recipes with Michelin-starred chef Jean-Christophe Novelli, and working with David Beckham and the Duchess of York (on her WeightWatchers’ range). The Executive Chef has made waves in North Island Seychelles and he launched Song Saa Island Resort in Cambodia, also winning accolades for his time at Nihiwatu Luxury Resort in Sumba Indonesia, Segera Retreat in Kenya and South Kensington Club in London.

 

 

The Origin of Tri’s Name

What’s in a name? Lara Drummond, demonstrates she has a Masters in Religious Studies from SOAS University – the School of Oriental and African Studies – when she explains the etymology of Tri here, and how the hotel’s name came to her…

Much as we all love long, exotic, mysterious hotel names, when it came to christening our contemporary design hotel, we were looking for something short that had meaning. It needed to span East and West, have spiritual and scientific significance, and be pertinent to modern architecture and of our eco-ethic.

‘Tri’ came to mind during my yoga practice as I stood in trikonasana – the triangle pose. Ancient Sanskrit is an Indo-European language, and so the root word ‘tri’ means three to both Eastern and Western ears. The number three is considered auspicious – even sacred – in most mystical traditions. Buddhism centres on the triratna, its three jewels are Buddha, dharma [his teachings], and sangha [monastic community]; Hinduism venerates Shiva whose main attribute is the trishula or trident; Christianity is a trinity of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost as alluded to by the crossing hand gesture – these are only a few examples.

Triangles were venerated in ancient times as a sacred shape and in Plato’s Theory of Everything he posited the triangle as the primary plane surface. In architecture, the use of the triangle is common because of its inherent strength – and you feel a strength in your body in yoga when the distance between the feet is the same as the distance between pelvis and leg, so the dragging of the feet apart is equal to the pull of gravity, and the result of this is stability.

Intended to be pronounced phonetically, ‘Tri’ is meant to be a play on the English word ‘tree’. Hugging the gentle hill that constitutes our promontory on Koggala Lake, Sri Lanka’s largest natural lake, the structures that make up Tri are built in a nautilus-shell spiral pattern, in keeping with the golden ratio. Our Koggala Lake hotel centres around the huge banyan tree that towers on the hill’s crown. The banyan tree is the little sister of the Bodhi fig tree, under which Buddha reached enlightenment, which is considered sacred to Buddhists (Sri Lanka’s main religion, and most prominent here in the Southern Province).

The tree features hugely in any spiritual context, representing the connection between Heaven and Earth, the giver of life and vitality. Mystical and philosophical traditions the world over use tree imagery, namely the Tree of Life, a many-branched tree which illustrates the idea that all life on earth is related. So when we checked and the domain for www.trilanka.com was still available, the decision was final. And Tri was born.

The Sweet Scent of Cinnamon

Ninety per cent of the world’s highest-quality cinnamon comes from Sri Lanka. Juliet Kinsman gets a lesson in how this deliciously fragrant spice is harvested and produced from Tri’s very own neighbours.

A fishing boat tour of Koggala Lake by sarong-wearing Douglas is a charming excursion in itself, but our cinnamon-obsessed outing would prove an even bigger treat for all the senses. Douglas kindly chaperoned us by dhoni across the lake, past fishermen, to another local industry care of a visit to a cinnamon planter at his home.

Sarath, the cinnamon farmer welcoming us off the boat up through some trees, past an impressive monitor lizard, to his small house in what felt like jungle. He gestured us to the family’s table and chairs just beyond where his wife was cradling a very happy-looking newborn baby. Here, with a glass of hot cinnamon tea, we learned how the fragrant sticks we buy in little jars in supermarkets back home are often hand made from the bark of a Sri Lankan tree by an experienced artisan just such as Sarath.

Cinnamon has been on sweet and savoury menus around the world since the Portuguese discovered this aromatic wild tree in Sri Lanka and it’s fascinating to get such a close-up view of how it’s processed by hand. Expertly, Sarath’s experienced hands demonstrated how the bark is carved off branches of the cinnamon tree. The stems are processed straight after harvesting while the inner bark is still wet – after the outer bark is masterfully scraped off, he tapped the wood with a hammer to loosen the inner bark – it would be this which would become the familiar spice. Since the exterior woody bark is a byproduct, this is what was used for the cladding of Tri’s constructions. It’s quite captivating to observe these curved sticks of raw cinnamon being peeled off and proficiently rolled into the more familiar brown quills.

We didn’t feel like tourists in a group expedition as we sat with our new Sinhala friend in his front yard and discovered from him how this time-tested tradition endures. It felt as though Douglas has taken us to meet  his extended family who was only too happy to spill the secrets to a technique he had proudly mastered over a lifetime. And we were only too delighted to be able to spice up our lives by buying some aromatic Ceylon cinnamon oils and sticks from source to take home.

The Tri Cinnamon Experience (1.5 hours): a private dhoni boat on the lake takes you to visit a cinnamon island where a family live and produce cinnamon products. They demonstrate peeling and let guests touch and taste. (Cost US$25 per person.)

 

Sustainable Intelligent Architecture

Shanghai-based A00’s architect Raefer Wallis is a trailblazer in sustainable design, and as his achievements with Tri demonstrate, he has an unrivalled appreciation for contemporary architecture, renewability, and sustainability.  Born in Quebec, Canada with New Zealander heritage, Wallis obtained a Masters in Architecture from Montreal’s McGill University – then head to Asia where he was behind China’s first carbon-neutral hotel, URBN Shanghai.

 “My mantra is: Big picture first, details after. Landscape first, people after.” —Raefer Willis, architect.

A00 wanted to create architecture that is as striking as it is ‘invisible’ because of the way the buildings fall away from view to allow the beauty of the site, and surrounding landscape, to be the focus. The land’s natural spiral shape conjures the mathematical Fibonacci sequence and this was the inspiration that guided the hotel’s layout. It seemed only fitting that the sacred nuga tree that sits atop the hill would be the focal point of a golden ratio spiral – this helped them position all the independent structures around the hill.

Since Rob Drummond was always a fan of the architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright, he was also interested in having modular buildings and collaborated with A00 to create a unique property for Sri Lanka. Architect John Lautner, too, was also an inspiration – he is the architect behind the ultimate villas fit for a Bond villain, including Sheats Goldstein Residence, the futuristic-looking house that features in The Big Lebowski.

Using the landscape was a critical aspect of the design, this allowed eight suites to be ‘hidden’ along the hillside without any interruption to the views, while also allowing each suite to feel utterly private, with its own look out over Koggalla Lake. Green roofs and solar panelling are just some of the features that betray Tri’s sustainability and with the contemporary glass and pale-wood constructions, the characterful cladding is cinnamon wood – a byproduct of the local spice trade which exports the bark. The green sloped roof hides the solar water heaters while the interiors include white polished terrazzo, local granite, and earth rendered walls.

The water tower, which houses has two guest bedrooms, is covered with a cinnamon-stick-screen skin, and sits within a reflection pond that also mirrors the golden ratio silhouette. Creeping vines that were planted along the base of the walls are already flourishing. Hidden next to this tower is the open-air, yoga shala, which hides its three stories housing the library and spa, from a sudden drop in terrain.

The main pavillion structure serves as the main social hub – its 10m cantilevered roof represents some of the most striking architecture of Tri. It acts as the dining space, poolside lounge and the reception area, while allowing guests to a swim in an infinity pool with the best possible Koggalla Lake views.