Marrakesh – A foodie’s guide PT 1

I recently returned from a trip to the beautiful city of Marrakesh, Morocco. Whilst there were many reasons involved in making Marrakesh my destination of choice such as the culture and the incredible scenery; me being the gluttonous animal that I am that’s always thinking about his stomach, meant that the countries’ food played a big part in my decision.

Now supposing anyone reading this is one day planning to visit the city of Marrakesh, (something I highly recommend you do) then hopefully my experiences will prove of some use to you. I am however by no means some Moroccan culinary don, due to the lack of time I had coupled with my inability to decipher any of form of map I unfortunately did not end up eating in many

of the places that I wanted to. Before I get into where I ate and what I thought of it I decided it might be helpful to throw out a few pointers that everyone should consider before chowing down in the kesh. 

1. If in doubt order a tagine

I consider myself a bit of a food snob really. I’m not proud of it, I’d love to be able to go to spoons for lunch and not want to kill myself but unfortunately I just don’t possess that ability anymore. That being said the standard of food in Marrakesh I found to be very high. I ate in various places that I hadn't researched/didn't really like the look of due to the overwhelming 35 degree heat/being dragged there and found myself impressed overall. A safe bet wherever you go is always a tagine. As it’s the national dish of Morocco they do it everywhere and do it very well. During my stay I managed to have a tagine for lunch and dinner three out of four days and am happy to say I only found one of them mediocre.

     2.       Hygieneinell

The first thing you’ll have to come to terms with when visiting Marrakesh is the standards of hygiene. Unfortunately, there are none. Unless you’re willing to fork out top dollar to dine in the fanciest of restaurants for breakfast, lunch and dinner then this is something you’re just going to have to deal with. Understandably it’s a fairly hard adjustment for most, even myself. I mean I’ll sit with my hands down my pants for three quarters of the day then cook up a storm but as soon as there’s a fly anywhere near a kitchen I want to start crying.  Then again there are donkeys running through the street, there are stray cats on every corner, there are cobras slithering about on the square; if Marrakesh was the kind of city that 'antibacted' between each customer then it probably wouldn't be the exciting place it is.

    3.       Get your Duke of Edinburgh Award

I’m sure D of E awards involve map reading or something? I wouldn't know because I've never done it and I also can’t even be bothered to Google it. Regardless if you really do want to eat in specific restaurants that are a bit out the way then you’re going to have to live and breathe map reading. You’ll find a lot of the streets will be labelled on the map but won’t be IRL (In real life), which naturally is a massive pain. If you’re looking for somewhere in the Medina to eat at about 6 PM, then set off at 7 AM and you might get there an hour late. Maybe it’s just me, maybe I’m incredibly incompetent with maps but until someone proves me wrong, trying to find somewhere in the Medina/souks is a lost cause.  

Restaurant recommendations and more to come in part 2.