‘Moroccan’
When the drive to your hotel requires a 10 minute stretch down a dirt road in pitch black with no lights to be seen, restaurant options can be very limited. And by limited I mean that the meal can be nowhere other than the hotel’s terrace. Fortunately the hotel was Chez Talout in Skoura and was a sort of mini resort that even sported its own hammam.
For any fans of The Clash that have wondered what a casbah (or kasbah on Morocco) is, the answer can be found at Ait Ben Haddou, the biggest kasbah in all of Morocco. And after we rocked it we were in need of some food and found ourselves at Restaurant L’Oasis D’Or. The menu had items I had already tried out and one that had yet eluded me.
By day, a stall just down the street from my riad (hotel) in Marrakesh was perpetually busy. Not with customers, but with workers grinding beef, putting together sausages and butchering away. It was interesting to watch, but didn’t exactly whet my appetite. Yet, when I returned later that night I found the place bustling with locals jockeying for some food. At this point I knew whatever it was had to be mine.
What’s chwarma? Some might say it’s simply how you spell schwarma in Morocco. At least that’s what I thought when we stopped at Cafe Restaurant L’Etoile in the Djemaa Al Fnaa (Big Square) of Marrakesh’s Medina. We kind of stopped there on a whim considering every other place we had been to was a success so far, and I proceeded to order a Chwarma Sandwich with a side of frites.
In a quest for some of the best food down the street from our riad (hotel), we made our way to Dar Mimoun on Riad Zitoun Lakdim in the Medina. But don’t try to find the street sign because they basically don’t exist in Marrakesh. Just know that it’s there, somewhere. And inside is a veritable palace of space with some delicious-looking food.
When we first arrived in Marrakesh, we were in need of a snack. And while many of the restaurants in the Medina’s Djemaa Al Fnaa (also known as the Big Square), had the word “snack” in their names, we set our sights on Restaurant Chez Chegrouni. The menu was filled with what you might expect from a Moroccan restaurant: couscous and tajine (or tagine depending on the part of the menu).