Rice ‘N Spice Sri Lankan Cuisine

Four years after it opened, Orange County Sri Lankan restaurant Rice ‘N Spice operated in takeout-only mode during the pandemic, yet offered dishes so unique and delicious that we were willing to drive to Anaheim – multiple times – and eat in our parked car to enjoy it. Our prior experiences with Sri Lankan food were focused on largely stewed, Indian-influenced vegetarian dishes, but at Rice ‘N Spice, the food has plenty of meat or shrimp curry, additionally curried vegetables or fruits, and a base of either rice, noodles, or bread; it’s closer to Indonesian or Thai than Indian.

Today, Rice ‘N Spice still feels somewhat like a takeout experience thanks to a not particularly crowded or comfortable dining room, and what appears to be continued demand from people using delivery services. But most of the dishes aren’t meant to be eaten out of takeout containers; some even require a table or other hard surface to assemble.

When you order one of Rice ‘N Spice’s few but large dishes such as Hoppers (egg crepes), String Hoppers (rice noodle pancakes), or Godamba Roti (flour crepes) you’ll need to top them off with scoops of beef, pork, lamb, or shrimp, plus curried vegetables and coconut-chili sambal chutney before eating them. Siimlarly, if you pick the Lamprais – a banana leaf containing rice, eggplant, sambal, a hard-boiled egg, a meat cutlet, and pineapple curry – you’ll need room to unwrap it before digging in to explore its many treasures.

Of the entrees we’ve tried, only the gigantic mound of chopped up bread, vegetables, and meat (lamb, in our case) called Kottu feels like it’s totally fine coming out of a takeout container. Additional dishes, including full-sized portions of items found in the Lamprais, can be ordered a la carte along with more crepes, bread, and noodles.