Cooking and Eating Out in Morocco

The owner of this 5 burner stove spends a minimum of 4 hours in  the kitchen daily

One of the most striking things about Moroccan people is that they while the love most things American, they have not embraced our fast food culture.  Meals are prepared all day, every day from scratch.  Most women bake their on bread several times a week.  For mid-morning and mid-afternoon snacks, there is tea time at home.  Shops will close and schools empty as workers, teachers and students go on break at midday.  Families eat most of their meals together--breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Moroccan women spend 4 to 6 hours in the kitchen everyday, more if there is a special occasion such as an engagement party, or if relatives have come to town to stay for a few days.  At such times, the women will divide the tasks and work together.  For all-out shindigs like weddings, they will hire extra women and rent restaurant-size pots and serving platters.



Left over from party preparation: a propane tank, one of the stand-alone burners, and assorted pots that were too large to fit on the stove.

Prep time takes longer when everything is made from scratch. Fruits and vegetable are generally fresh, in season, not frozen or canned.  You want green beans?  You have to snap them.  Peas?  You get to shell them.  Think you'll want strawberries this winter?  I hope you remember to freeze some last spring.  The incentive to do-it-yourself is simple economics: frozen foods cost probably 3 times as much as fresh.  Who can afford that on a regular basis?

When you travel to someone's home, they would never presume that you picked up a burger and fries along the way.  They will immediately serve you tea or coffee, breads and pastries.  Then they will cook a big meal.  Then they will feed you more tea, coffee, breads or pastries to send you on your way.

Don't get me wrong, stores sell plenty of chocolate, chips and soda.  You can find all sorts of restaurants and American fast-food franchises.  There are desert shops that sell cake by the slice along with banana and avacado smoothies. There are lots of reputable street vendors whose wares are, fortunately, much better than those of  Terry Pratchett's Dibbler.  But generally speaking, there are only 3 reasons for eating out: as a necessity, as a special occasion, or as an unconscionable waste of money. 

So if you feel that cooking is a big headache, then come as a visitor.  If you're planning to stay in Morocco, you better bring your apron.

A Country House

 I went with a family here to see other family members  who live in the countryside. Their home is about 2 hours outside of Marrakech. We were going to take a bus, but the busses were crowded, the rates had gone up, and we ended up taking a taxi for about the same price.

The trip on the highway was nice.  Hills in the background. Flat farmland in the foreground. The occasional flock of sheep. Finally we turned off the highway onto a white gravel road that was bordered on both sides by fields of low greenery and followed it about a mile or two to its end. There was a single story modern building with lots of window and a low wall to our right--an elementary school. To our left was a single story adobe style compound . The wall around it extended down to the edge of the road. Sitting on the ground were  grandparents and a great-grand mother. They had just been sitting there, waiting for us to arrive. Hugs and kisses all around.

Inside the walls were several adobe buildings. One was the outhouse, which was in a corner and faced the rear wall of the compound. It will never be mentioned again. But there was a light, so you could go at night. Enough of that. There were two corral areas. The small one was for the chickens, rooster, and one very large turkey. Next to that was a much larger corral for the donkey. There were a couple of cats.

There were three buildings, one was a store that belonged to an uncle. One was just a large room, long and narrow--about 8 ft by 20 ft. The third was about 7ft by 30 ft. and was divided into 2 rooms with two separate entrances.  The left side was the kitchen that measured about 7ft by 12 ft. The right side of building was the living area. In both the living room and the other large room, which was used to sleep guests, the floors were carpeted and the the walls were lined with cushions, blankets and pillows for seating. The living room also had a low table for eating and a televison with great reception in the corner.

First we had the traditional tea, bread, and cookies. This little meal is not to be dismissed. They don't begin cooking the evening meal until after the guests arrive. They would never insult anyone with leftovers or cold food.  That means it will be a long while before dinner with every element prepared from scratch. So the tea service is an important little meal.

Dinner was chicken with lentils served over a bed of thin breads that had been rolled, flatened, layered, cooked, then torn into shreds and tasted like dumplings.  Four women helped prepare the dumplings. One to roll, one to cook, one or two to separate and tear. One of the woman also cooked the chicken and lentils. We ate with two tables at either end of the living room, one for grandfather and uncles, one near the tv for the women. The food was delicious. We also had large bowls of fruit--apples, bananas, oranges.

After dinner, the men left and the women had the tv. It was Saturday night and a variety music/comedy show came on. We danced playfully making fun of each other's style, or in my case, the lack thereof.  Everyone was dying laughing. I had just got going with an old fashioned, one-leg-up-in-the-air Chubby Checker twist when the grandmother and great grandmothers, practically on their sides laughing now, asked me to stop. I can't imagine why.

The Big Chicken

I made the kids fried chicken yesterday. I told them they better enjoy it because to get chicken here, I had to go to a LIVE CHICKEN STORE.  I had to tell the guy how many kilos I wanted. He picked a chicken, tied a string around its feet and hung it on a scale to weigh it. Then he  said Bismillah as he cut off its head, doused it in scalding water and put it in an automatic chicken-plucker. (An automatic chicken plucker--who knew?) Then he cut off the head and feet, gutted it, rinsed it off a couple of times and put it in a bag.

I had to take the chicken home, rub the whole thing inside and out with salt and rinse it with water. The salt kills the chicken smell. I'm not sure if that's dead chicken smell or live chicken smell. Better not to dwell on that point. Anyway, I put it in the fridge for a couple of hours while I recovered from the trauma.

When I took it out of the refridgerator, it looked and smelled like supermarket chicken. Hooray!!!!!

So then I fried it.  Yummy.