Foodie Friday: Typical Moroccan Dishes

When you think of Moroccan food, what’s the first thing that comes to mind? Because for me, prior to my travels there, it was spices. I was thrilled to try dishes packed with flavor and potentially palate-burning spices.

What I found instead, was bland and boring food, sadly. In fact, I can count on two fingers the number of meals that I actually enjoyed in my two weeks there. That’s pretty pathetic, right? Walking through the souqs, you come across one spice peddler after another, but it seems that none of the restaurants are purchasing these spices (or if they are, they’re not using them liberally).

Two of the most typical Moroccan dishes are tajine and couscous.

Tajine is a typical Berber dish, made in the natural clay tajine pots, which you’ll see all over the place in Morocco. Tajine is a sort of stew made with sliced veggies (carrots, potatoes, green beans, olives), some variety of meat (typically lamb, chicken, and sometimes fish), and spiced with both sweet and spicy. It kind of has a tangy flavor, but it isn’t overwhelming. Instead, it’s a bit bland and lets the flavors of the vegetables and meat speak for themselves. Oftentimes, it’s served alongside a basket of bread, which is good for soaking up the minimal liquid in the bottom of the pot.

Couscous is, in my opinion, the better of the two Moroccan dishes, and also the most well-known. I have long had a deep love for couscous. There was a Moroccan restaurant in a town close to where I went to college that had the best veggie couscous I’ve ever had in my life (still to this day). By the end of my trip in Morocco though, I was so sick of eating it. Like, totally over it. And then I had to eat it one more time because my friend’s family invited us over for dinner and labored for hours over cooking it. I am so glad it was the meal they prepared though, as it was the best of the trip and some of the best I’ve had. The couscous itself was light and fluffy, the chicken was delicious and tender, and the vegetables were fresh and awesome. Plus, it wasn’t bland in the least, thankfully.

I certainly won’t be rushing back to Morocco for the food and I haven’t been craving it since I left, but I am happy to have tried its traditional dishes (even if they were lacking in flavor).