Promptly at 10AM, we head to La Maison Arabe's cooking school to meet our interpreter and sous chef Mohammed Nahir. To our good fortune, instead of the original nine participants there will only be four — Gypsy, a young Kiwi gal living in England, a Dallas woman, and me! After introductions and a brief background on Moroccan cooking, we head around the corner to visit a local baker who supplies much of La Maison Arabe's breads and also does other baking for the neighborhood. Once back at the Riad, we are taken to the teaching kitchen on the premises that has eight cooking stations, plus the cook's station. Here, we meet Dada Aida, one of the head chefs at La Maison Arabe, who will be our teacher in the art of tagine cooking.
At each cooking station are TV monitors to watch along, but since our class is petite, there is no need. Our task is to learn how to make Chicken Tagine with Preserved Lemon, Olives & Saffron, two side dishes — Zalouk Salad (aubergine and tomato) and Taktuka Salad (green pepper and tomato), and observe the art of Moroccan bread-making. What fun . . . I am "hooked!" I want to attend more cooking schools . . . here in Morocco (too bad there is no time) and other places in the world I want to travel.
Gypsy and I chop, stir, learn to make roses out of tomato peels . . . all the while the smells of garlic, cumin, coriander, ginger turmeric and saffron scent the air. Afterwards, we four "chefs" sit outside on the patio to eat the products of our loving toil — yummy! ! ! And, for dessert . . . a pastilla!
Some of what we learned:
- There are three types of Pastilla that are served at special occasions — chicken, seafood, and dessert.
- Another food served for special occasions is Mechoui — whole lamb cooked on a spit.
- Dessert is generally some variety of almond cookie with honey and fruit.
- There are 7 principal veggies used in Moroccan cooking: carrots, turnips, zucchini, eggplant, parsnips, cabbage, pumpkin — as well as chickpeas (soaked overnight).
- Red onions are preferred as they are sweeter.
- When cooking with saffron, it is best to put 3-4 threads to road in warm water for 15 minutes (use the water later in the meal preparation) or pulverize in a mortar and pestle 3-4 threads with a pinch of salt .
- When cooking use olive oil or a combination of olive oil and clarified butter / ghee.
- Marinate fish (1 hour), meat (score meat first and then marinate 3-6 hours in the refrigerator), and chicken (overnight) before cooking. Use the spice combinations below with 8 oz of water.
- Ras el Hanout is an exotic salt-free spice blend found in Morocco that is often over 30 ingredients including cinnamon, chill peppers, coriander, cumin, nutmeg, peppercorns, cardamon and cloves.
- Herbs used in Moroccan cooking are: parsley, cilantro (coriander), garlic — use less when using cinnamon; otherwise as much as you want.
Spice / Marinade Combinations
- Meat & Veggies — salt, pepper, ginger powder, turmeric.
- Meat & Fruit — salt, pepper, ginger powder, turmeric, Ras el Hanout, cinnamon and saffron.
- Veggies only — salt, pepper, ginger powder, turmeric, cumin, sweet paprika.