Meaning
A soft flatbread made by folding ground, seasoned split peas (dhal) into the dough before it is rolled out and cooked on a flat griddle. It comes from Indo-Caribbean cooking and is one of the breads served with curry in roti shops, either torn up to scoop the sauce or wrapped around curry chicken, goat, or vegetables.
Examples
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Mi buy a dhalpuri wid curry chicken.
I bought a dhalpuri with curry chicken.
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Di dhalpuri soft, yuh can use it fi scoop up di curry.
The dhalpuri is soft, so you can use it to scoop up the curry.
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Him wrap di curry goat inna dhalpuri.
He wrapped the curry goat in dhalpuri.
Origin
From Hindi 'dal' (split peas or lentils) and 'puri' (a small fried bread). Indian indentured workers brought it to the Caribbean, and more than 36,000 of them came to Jamaica between 1845 and 1917. See Roti.
How it’s used
The name says 'puri', which is a fried bread in India, but dhalpuri is cooked on a griddle, so it is closer to roti. The filling is usually seasoned with cumin and garlic. See Curry goat, Curry chicken.