Core memories are powerful things. For me, they never manifest solely in my mind, but tug at all my senses, and all the emotions. They are visions and sounds and aromas that stay with me, maybe even define who I am. 

I recall the hottest afternoons of my childhood: there was always a king coconut seller somewhere nearby. A kind, homely man or woman, earning an honest living beside the road. I can still hear the sound of the machete, that clean crack, and then the water, cool and sweet, rushing out. I would tilt my head back and take generous sips. In an instant, the heat was gone. A distant memory.

I can’t remember a time we ever reached for ice water. We had Thambili.

My mother would give us curd for dessert: a small cup, nothing elaborate. Just cold buffalo curd, topped with treacle. It was a treat, simple as that, received and enjoyed. So deliciously sweet that you could not get enough, yet you could indulge to your heart’s content. 

I recall coconut husks and coconut shells, scattered everywhere, always underfoot. We kicked them around, threw them at each other, used them as makeshift cricket balls in the street. 

In a word, that was childhood: joy. All those little moments and memories, they could have easily been stowed away at the back of my mind. Just simple nostalgia, and nothing more.

But instead, they were the seeds of a lifelong passion. 

Many years passed. I grew up, moved through life, ever more inquisitive. 

I would ask people: do you know what coconut oil does for your skin? For your hair? Do you know what is actually inside king coconut water? Most people didn’t. And I understood why, because I hadn’t known either, not really. Not until the questions rang in my head and I went looking for the answers.

As a boy, I used to watch Sri Lanka play cricket. I remember watching Arjuna Ranatunga and Aravind de Silva bat under the afternoon sun, these giants of the game, and during a break, someone from the dugout would run out and hand one of them a banana. For fuel and recovery.

I watch cricket today, and I see players mid-game reaching for specially formulated sports beverages. 

And every time, I think the same thing: why not king coconut water? Why not the thing that has been naturally doing this job, on this island, for thousands of years?

That’s one of the things I find most remarkable: how little known the medicinal and therapeutic benefits are. 

Our ancestors knew them well, and developed practices to heal and preserve their health. And now, modern science has validated what they knew. 

The lauric acid in virgin coconut oil protects and repairs the skin. Jackfruit and king coconut water carry compounds that support heart health. These foods( all of them, including kithul treacle and wild bee honey) have the ability to reduce chronic inflammation in the body. That matters because chronic inflammation is now understood to be the underlying condition behind cancer, diabetes, and Alzheimer’s disease.

More striking still was a truth that brought everything into focus: these flavors exist nowhere else on earth. No other soil, no other climate, no other confluence of conditions can produce them. 

That was the inspiration, the moment that Ceylon Fine Flavors truly formed. They could be found nowhere else on Earth, so why not take them to the world? They deserve to be shared. But it had to be in the way that nature intended. The island’s treasures, as they are meant to be.

And so, more than a business, Ceylon Fine Flavors is my attempt at sharing the country I love, through a language of flavors, senses and memories shared.