Dishes · Malabar food glossary
Pathiri
Also known as: Ari Pathiri, Rice roti
A soft, thin rice-flour flatbread — the everyday bread of the Malabar Muslim table, eaten with curry.
Pathiri is a soft flatbread made from fine rice flour, water and salt, rolled thin and cooked on a griddle, often puffed over a flame. It is the staple bread of the Mappila kitchen, eaten most commonly with chicken, beef, fish or egg curry.
Many Malabar dishes are built on the pathiri — irachi pathiri (meat-stuffed), meen pathiri (fish-stuffed), and the layered chatti pathiri all begin with this basic rice bread.