Ispent the 2022 Christmas period in Morocco – some sun, good food, and a culture I’m fascinated by; I definitely made the right choice.
The tour I went on involved one day in Marrakesh before visiting other beautiful parts of the country. During our very brief walk in the Medina, I spotted a sign for the Moroccan Culinary Arts Museum so as soon as I had wi-fi, I googled it (food + museum, what’s not to love?), and found that not only is it a museum, it hosts cooking classes!
Thankfully, I had some days post-tour to spend in Marrakesh and so on Boxing Day I went to learn how to cook some great local dishes and was really pleased with the whole experience.
On the menu in this class was:
Salade d’aubergne or Zaalouk, also known as aubergine caviar. A popular Moroccan salad made up of aubergine, tomato, garlic and spices, served warm.
Salade de poivron vert/green pepper salad. A simple cold salad made up of diced roasted green peppers, tomato, onion with olive oil, lemon juice, salt and ground cumin.
Tagine de poulet au citron/ Chicken tagine with lemon and olives. What it says on the tin, a tasty dish with plenty of spices, cooked in a tagine.
Pastilla au lait/Milk pastilla. A Moroccan dessert made up of pastry layers, a simple custard with a little orange blossom water, and toasted almonds.
First step was to get the chicken tagine on the go. I’d had a few tagines across the trip, but the chicken with lemon and olives was definitely my favourite, so I was excited to make it myself from scratch – there’s something for me about working from a written recipe versus learning and making at the same time.
So, onion, garlic, spices and some water went in, followed by the chicken. Then the lid went on and it was onto the Zaalouk and the green pepper salad.
I’ve been really ‘into’ aubergine over the last couple of years (as much as you can be ‘into’ a vegetable) and because it’s a common dish in Morocco, of course I tried the Zaalouk a few days earlier in Fes and enjoyed it.
For the Zaalouk, you need to cook down the aubergine, add in chopped tomato and then cook it down even more. It’s a super simple dish to make and I’m looking forward to making it now that I’m home.
Something I found though, over the many lunches and dinners on the tour, salt doesn’t get used much, same for acid, so I added a bit more of both than the recommended amount and I was very pleased with the result.
The green pepper salad was very refreshing – a cold salad, with chopped tomato, onion, roasted green peppers, fresh herbs, and ground cumin – an ingredient I’d never considered putting in a cold/raw salad.
Side note: We peeled tomatoes to use as decorative roses and I can confirm, I am not a deft hand at fine/detailed work.
And lastly, what would a meal be without the dessert? The pastilla au lait is comprised of thin pastry sheets layered between a simple custard and some toasted almonds. We didn’t make the pastry, but I’m kind of glad about that – something that thin tends to require experience.
In the case of this particular dish, the teacher said that the custard should be made in advance to ensure the pastry doesn’t get soggy from the hot custard. Of course, we didn’t have time for that, so when we got around to eating it, we had to imagine some crispy layers amongst the custard.
To flavour the custard we used a splash of orange blossom. I mentioned to the teacher that cardamom would go well, but she was horrified and said that cardamom should only be used in meat dishes and instead gave me some gum arabic, which had a slightly minty flavour to it, to try as an alternative.
The results
If you’ve made it this far, I don’t think the fact that it was delicious will be any surprise to you. I probably wouldn’t have taken the time to write about my experience if it was bad.
We ate on the roof terrace in the sun. The food was excellent, full of flavour and very moreish. All I needed to complete the meal was bread, which, when you’re in Morocco, is thankfully an important part of the meal, so I didn’t have to look far.
I think the facilities at the museum are excellent and perfect for groups of all sizes. The team running the classes work like a finely oiled machine and I really enjoyed the overall experience. If you’re looking for a value-for-money cooking class to give you some foundational Moroccan cooking skills, I can definitely recommend this one.
Moroccan Culinary Arts Museum/ Musée d’Art Culinaire Marocain
Even if cooking classes aren’t for you, but you like food, the museum is worth a visit.
Not only is the riad it’s in really stunning – one of the best examples I saw while in Morocco – the museum itself was well laid out and the displays were high quality. As someone who goes to a lot of museums, I thought it made learning about Moroccan food very easy.
