Cooking Class in Essaouira: A Taste of Moroccan Hospitality
Buying food in the local market, cooking in a Moroccan home, and eating a delicious traditional meal
I love Moroccan food. In fact, just smelling spices like cinnamon, cumin and cardamon makes me happy. I love the fresh mint tea that is served everywhere in Morocco and couscous and tagines and olives and crusty French bread fresh from a wood oven. Not to mention pomegranates and dates and prunes and heaps of fresh, pungent coriander.
So when my husband, Gerhard, and I decided to spend two weeks in Morocco, one of the things I was looking forward to the most was eating! Eating in restaurants is lovely, but eating in the home of local people is better. And learning how to cook some of the dishes myself is the best of all.
This is why I started researching cooking classes several weeks before we headed to Essaouira, a port city on Morocco’s Atlantic coast. We chose Essaouira for our holiday because it is smallish (about 78,000 inhabitants), easier to maneuver in than a city like Marrakesh, windy, and on the sea. This meant that Gerhard would be able to kite surf and I would be able to explore the medina (old town) without feeling overwhelmed.
I discovered that several people/organizations in Essaouira offer cooking classes. The class that appealed to me the most was hosted by Latifa, who teaches in her own home. As I soon learned, this was a wonderful decision.
The first meeting
Latifa and I arranged to meet at the entrance to the medina, which is entirely enclosed by a high wall, at 9:30 am. We soon found each other, and it was nice to discover that she speaks excellent English. She told me that just one other person would participate in the class that day.
After a brief wait, we saw a young woman walking toward us. With a smile, she said her name was Christina and that she was from Germany. She also explained that she and her English partner, a photographer, were spending several months traveling throughout Morocco in their camper van.
Christina, Latifa and I discussed the possible menu options. We decided on a vegetarian tagine with chickpeas, couscous, and a cooked eggplant salad called zalouk. For dessert, we would have beghrir, a tender, spongy, Moroccan pancake made from semolina wheat.
The visit to the market
Once we had decided on the menu, we walked through the medina gates and headed for the open-air market. I am not much of a clothes or shoe shopper, but the smells and colors of fresh fruit, vegetables, herbs, spices and grains in farmers’ markets make me want to buy everything in sight!
Although we had decided on a vegetarian meal, Latifa showed us where she buys eggs and chicken. She explained that it is extremely important to her to know that the meat she buys is fresh and local. Therefore, she always chooses a live chicken, and the butcher kills it while she waits. He then puts the carcass through a machine that removes all of the feathers. The entire process, she said, takes about ten minutes. After purchasing the bird, she takes it home and cooks it immediately.
I was glad I did not witness this process, but what Latifa said made me think. Most Europeans and Americans buy their meat in sanitary, plastic-wrapped packages, far removed from the actual living animals. In the vast majority of cases, chickens in particular are crowded together in cages, fed antiobiotic-laced foods, are never able to move about freely, and have short, miserable lives. After being slaughtered, they are transported, sometimes thousands of miles, to their end destinations.
If you are going to eat meat, Latifa’s way is so much healthier, fresher and more humane. Above all, there is a respect for life and death that is missing from the sterile, disconnected objects we purchase in our grocery stores.
In the kitchen
After purchasing our food—and making an extra visit to the baker’s, where we bought a delicious, crispy baguette still warm from the wood oven—we headed for Latifa’s apartment.
She began by preparing a snack for us (which was most welcome, because I did not have time to eat breakfast that morning): mint tea, fresh bread, olives and tender, flaky cookies.
Then we got to work! First we cut up the vegetables for the tagine.
Then we put the eggplants for the zalouk on an open flame to char their skins.
Next, Latifa put the couscous on a double boiler to steam it. Then she placed it in a large bowl, and we added water, a little at a time, while constantly rubbing the couscous between our hands to remove every trace of a lump.
Latifa used many of the spices and aromatics pictured below in our tagine and eggplant salad.
We also mixed up the batter for the beghrir. The recipe used both baking powder and yeast, which surprised me. The end result didn’t rise at all (like bread does). Instead, it turned into in a tender, spongy pancake filled with holes.
Enjoying the results
After about three hours of effort, our meal was ready and we got to enjoy the delicious results in Latifa’s brightly colored living room.
Because the cooking class happened to take place during Ramadan, Latifa was not able to eat with us. But she did keep us company while we ate, and Christina and I were able to ask her questions and learn more about her life in Essaouria.
I was impressed with Latifa’s knowledge of nutrition, her desire to eat healthy food like vegetables and fruits, and her commitment to making delicious meals from scratch for her family. She was also very aware of the climate crisis and the need to conserve energy wherever possible.
A note on Ramadan
Ramadan is a month-long period of fasting and prayer for Muslims that begins and ends with the sighting of the crescent moon. The Muslim calendar is shorter than the Gregorian calendar, so Ramadan begins about 10-12 days earlier each year. This means that over a 33-year cycle, it will eventually take place in every season.
During Ramadan, nothing can touch the mouth from sunrise to sunset. This includes food, cigarettes, kissing—and water. When Ramadan occurs in the hottest parts of the year, I do not understand how people can go all day without drinking water. They tell me that it can be difficult, but that they manage. (Young children, the elderly and the ill are not expected to fast during Ramadan.)
Close-up pictures
Below is a picture of each dish in our meal.
Further information
If you plan to travel to Essaouria, I highly recommend Latifa’s cooking course. To learn more, go to Latifa Cooking Courses
What a delightful, delicious experience that must have been!