Cimply Yummy, on the outside, looks like most other restaurants in Sri Lanka that serve up a clean Kottu. Which, essentially it is. But, unlike other roadside kottu places, this one gives the option of going with bacon kottu!
And what other excuse do you need to check this place out?
Ambience
Cream coloured walls, plastic chairs and glass table tops, accompanied by the tell-tale fluorescent lighting and a glass food showcase with a bunch of carbs and curries the interior here is quite similar to most of the roadside kadeys.
Nonetheless, it seemed clean enough so it's an option if you're looking to dine in. Of course, they're not particularly fancy, but, we can't really complain.
Food
Covering the basics of rice, kottu and string hoppers and even a couple of soups and salads, the food menu at Cimply Yummy is pretty much like every roadside kadey in Colombo.
We decided to stick to the basics on this one. The String Hopper Kottu with Roast Chicken (Rs. 300 for medium) was big. Sadly, this was actually our least favourite of the three. However, it was far from being anywhere close to bad.
With lots of thinly sliced carrots, leeks and other stuff that seemed to disappear into the mix, this seemed to fit the bill of the staple String Hopper Kottu in Colombo. But, one thing that completely set it apart from the rest was the sheer amount of roast chicken pieces we found in it. We mean this in a very literal sense when we say that every bite of it had chicken.
The reason we called this our least favourite was because, while everything else seemed fine, it lacked salt, which, while not necessarily killing it for us, didn't do much in terms of boosting it in the preference section.
Ayy, we're a tad excited for this one. As disastrous as it looks in this particular picture, the Seafood Garlic Rice(Rs. 500 for medium), coming with a gorgeous pineapple achcharu thing and an egg on the side, was WOW. Greasy, with lots of veggies and an extremely generous amount of seafood, we absolutely loved this one. The rice, which seemed to be cooked quite well was hardened only by the frying part of the process, seasoned to the point of us questioning every other fried rice we've had. Plus, it was plentiful with seafood. There was so many to go with every bite.
Last on the list of stuff we got was the Bacon Cheese Kottu (Rs.650). Could this be considered the recipe for cholesterol? Probably. Do we care? Not even a little bit.
The Bacon Cheese Kottu, we were told, is the most popular item on their list. All we needed was a good whiff of it to understand why. Teamed up with an array of veggies, this particular kottu was loaded with bacon bits. We're pretty sure they used the oil from the bacon to temper the ghodhamba as well because literally every bit of this beaut was a physical representation of bacon. I'm crying just thinking about it.
Spicy and packed with flavour, this came in a portion enough for two. We should warn you that the "cheese" part of the "cheese kottu" is limited to chunks of Happy Cow at every 3rd or 4th spoonful. Nonetheless, if you eat bacon, you're absolutely going to love this one. 5/5 for the kottu alone – would recommend it either way.
Service
The staff was super friendly throughout and seemed to be so to everyone at the restaurant. They kept a close watch to make sure people weren't lacking anything and offered us something on the house because of the long waiting time (30-40 mins).
Conclusion
In conclusion, we loved it. The ambience was alright, the staff was wonderful and the food, beyond good. Sure, it's not the healthiest option out there, but it's definitely worth looking out for when you're looking to treat yourself.
