Egg hoppers recipe

A bowl of fermented rice batter swirled up the sides of a deep round pan, lacy and brown at the rim, with an egg set in the soft centre.

11 hourshard8 ingredients

Ingredients

• 300 g rice flour
• 400 ml coconut milk
• 4 eggs
• 1 tsp yeast
• 1 tsp sugar
• 200 ml water
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp oil

How to make Egg hoppers

1. Dissolve 1 tsp of yeast and 1 tsp of sugar in 200 ml of warm water and leave 10 minutes until it foams.
2. Whisk 300 g of rice flour with the yeast mixture, 200 ml of thin coconut milk and 100 ml of water into a smooth batter about the thickness of cream.
3. Cover and ferment 8 to 12 hours, overnight. This step is not optional: a 30-minute rest gives a flat pancake, not a hopper.
4. In the morning stir in 400 ml of thick coconut milk and 1 tsp of salt. The batter should smell slightly sour and be full of bubbles.
5. Heat a hopper pan (appa chatti, a small deep bowl-shaped wok) over medium heat and wipe it with oil. A flat frying pan cannot make the bowl shape.
6. Pour in a small ladle of batter, lift the pan by both handles and swirl so the batter climbs the sides in a thin film, leaving a thicker pool at the bottom.
7. Crack 1 egg straight into that pool, cover with a lid and cook 3 to 4 minutes until the rim is lacy and brown, the white set and the yolk still soft.
8. Ease the hopper out with a wooden spatula and eat it at once, with lunu miris or seeni sambol.

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