The Gallery Café
2 Alfred House Gardens, Colombo 00300, Sri Lanka
Cuisine:InternationalSri Lankan
- Dine-in
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In short
Regional Sri Lankan dishes in relaxed, family-friendly rooms near Colombo's Horton Place roundabout, overlooking Viharamahadevi Park. An easy introduction to the island's curries.
Upali's by Nawaloka is a Sri Lankan restaurant at 65 C W W Kannangara Mawatha in Colombo 7, near the Horton Place roundabout and overlooking Viharamahadevi Park. It serves regional dishes from across the island in relaxed, family-friendly rooms, and suits visitors who want an easy introduction to Sri Lankan curries.
The location fits a day around the park, the National Museum or Town Hall. Prices are moderate for central Colombo, and the top floor is a calmer place to sit at night.
The menu draws on cooking from every part of Sri Lanka, and Time Out describes it as all about the spicy side of the cuisine. Start with a fresh thambili (king coconut) and maalu cutlets. For mains, the north is represented by Jaffna-style chicken varuwal and the south by maalu ambul thiyal, the sour fish curry of Matara. Loku isso (marinated jumbo prawns), batu moju (aubergine pickle) and seafood kottu round out a shared table. Ordering several curries with rice lets everyone compare regional styles side by side.
Desserts are Sri Lankan classics: kiri pani (curd with treacle), wiskothu puddima (biscuit pudding) and house ice creams, including coconut.
Upali's opens every day from 11:30 to 22:30. Reservations are recommended, particularly for an upstairs table in the evening; call +94 11 269 5812.
The restaurant is the work of Upali Dharmadasa, chairman of the Nawaloka Group and a former president of Sri Lanka Cricket. It occupies the house his family moved into in 1953, which he chose to turn into a restaurant instead of selling, and it opened around 2012. His father started the Nawaloka business with a hotel in Peliyagoda in the 1940s. Prawn curry, parippu (dhal) and string hoppers are the house staples, and the chocolate biscuit pudding comes from a family recipe.
Sources: Sunday Times Sri Lanka, 2016. Facts checked November 2026.
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CloseSun - 11:30–22:30
- Monday11:30–22:30
- Tuesday11:30–22:30
- Wednesday11:30–22:30
- Thursday11:30–22:30
- Friday11:30–22:30
- Saturday11:30–22:30
- Sunday11:30–22:30
Dine-in
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