Rocky Café
Welcome to Ella, the jungly tourist town in the hills of south Sri Lanka, where trendy foreigners indulge in their favorite international (vegan) foods, after having eaten veg fried rice, hoppers and shredded coconut for days.
In the tropical streetscape of Ella’s main road, Rocky Café is slightly recessed. You can recognize it by its signboard displaying a blue owl. We chose this place for lunch because I wanted to eat some pizza, and a Google Maps search surfaced it as an option. On a second search however, the review snippet mentioning a “vegan pizza” was nowhere to be found. Equally gaslighting was the menu board outside the café: the dozens of dishes listed did not include “pizza”. Luckily, after some confused searching, a small, switched-off neon “pizza” sign far above eye level relieved my concerns.
When passing around the menu, waiter Ashan confirmed that pizza’s were available (on the last page), and indeed the actual menu booklet touted one “vegan pizza” (the last line), which I ordered. Ashan graciously asked if I wanted it with coconut or mozzarella cheese, from which I picked the former. For drinks, I ordered a “mint-passion ice tea”.
The pizza arrived to the table after a wait of about 30 minutes, which was slightly longer than expected. I had received a maximalist Lanka-style pizza: small pieces of pineapple, shreds of jackfruit and coconut meat, thin slices of bell pepper, onion and black olive. What had me worried was the thick, greasy-looking white coconut “cheese” layer fully covering it all.
Luckily, after the first bite, this cheese felt light, or at least less dense than some of the packaged coconut-oil based cheeses one might get in Europe (Violife, anyone?). Those are good, but can quickly drown out the flavors of the tomato sauce and other toppings when used excessively. Here, I could still taste them despite the excess. This “cheese” seemed much closer to the viscous coconut cream you may find in a coconut milk can.
Regardless, once I was at 3/4ths of the pizza, I started feeling full. And I think the coconut cream was still the culprit. I mindfully didn’t eat most of the last 8th piece to prevent feeling too bloated. Tarunika wasn’t present, but would probably be proud of me.
Overall, the pizza was enjoyable. I generally prefer more minimalist pizza’s, with a hearty San Marzano tomato sauce and a well-picked topping or two. But once in a while, I appreciate (or make) a pizza that has it all. And where better to get one with tropical ingredients than in Sri Lanka? Here, I can assume that most the ingredients were fresh and local produce, because I saw them hanging on trees and shrubs throughout my trip (coconut, jackfruit, pineapple, tomatoes). Canned jackfruit can taste horrible. Fresh, it can’t do much harm! Otherwise, the pizza base was crisp, and not too thin either, to fit the lavish toppings.
I’m don't know how Rocky's pizzas compare to other vegan pizzas on Ella Road, but it is probably a solid choice. 4/5 for the pizza, considering the context.
Bonus: the mint-passion “ice tea”
The “ice tea” came in some ten minutes before the pizza (which I also thought a long wait for an ice tea). Then again, it probably was not an iced tea. It looked and tasted like a crossover between a tropical smoothie and a slushie. It was a smoothie in the sense that passion fruit seeds still floated around in the dense mixture, and that soda or ice tea was nowhere to be detected in the drink. It did taste like passion fruit (and kiwi). It was a slushie in the sense that the core was semi-frozen, breaking slowly apart into cold, refreshing slush. All this could be sucked up through a non-dissolving, reliable metal straw (those paper ones are not my favorite). Ice cubes not necessary. I don’t think I got what I ordered, but in the tropical heat, I had no complaints. 5/5.
Oh, finally: shoutout to Ashan. All waiters here ask for reviews of their restaurants and sometimes themselves (on Google Maps), but this guy really earned one. He was naturally friendly, unhurried, agreeable and well-spoken.
