Fes Cooking Class

One of my main aims in going to Fes was to do a Moroccan cooking class and learn how to cook a tagine, and that I did. There was a link on the Dar El Hana website to Cooking Lessons and I am lucky I cooked on it as it led to Lahcen and his cooking classes. As we had booked in advance, Lahcen met us at 9.30 am Dar El Hana and took us shopping in the Municipal Marche in central Fes, as they have fish for sale there on Saturdays. After much discussion we (the 4 of us) decided to cook harira (the traditional Moroccan tomato-based soup), lamb tagine with apricots and almonds, stuffed calamari and for dessert, crepes with cheese, raisins and almonds. We trailed Lahcen around the market as he checked out the seafood, then bought vegetables, dried fruit, spices and a huge chunk of lamb shoulder. Although the spices are in different bags on the stall, they are bought and mixed together in a small piece of paper in which they are wrapped. We also got chick peas that had already been soaked from the spice stall along with some cinnamon sticks. Celery here is also very weird, more like a herb with thin stems rather than the thick stems we are used too, but it does still have the celery taste. The really good think about the trip to the market was that we could ask questions, "What is that fruit? What is that used for? What is in that pot?" Being Berber who grew up in the Atlas mountains and having spend time cooking in a number of restaurants, Lahcen has an excellent knowledge of local foods and very good English in which to explain things. Along the way he told us a Fig Desert:

Fig Dessert
Fresh Figs
Honey
Thyme

Drizzle whole figs with honey, sprinkle with thyme and roast. Serve cut in half with creme fraiche or on their own.

Now all I have to do is try it, but the fig season is nearly over.

He then took us back to Riad Tafilalet where we would be doing the cooking. We decided we would like to prepare to eat in the evening so we didn't have to return until 4.00 pm after we had had a mint tea and some almond bread in the riad courtyard and experienced the view from the rooftop terrace.
We finally got back at 4.30 after having trouble catching taxis and it was downstairs to the kitchen and on with the white, cooks jackets. Lahcen guided as we chopped, grated (did you know you can grate tomatoes), diced, fried, stirred, blanched, soaked and scraped the meat and vegetables. Finally the harira, tagine and calamari were on cooking. The tagine in a pressure cooker as is the norm here unless the meat is marinated the night before. Tumeric (or saffron), ginger and black pepper made up the spices in the tagine. Mmm, the smell was good.


Soaked raisins and crushed almonds were then mixed with the goat's cheese and used as filling in the crepes that were then rolled up, topped with melted butter and sesame seeds before being baked in the oven.

Finally all was ready and we went upstairs to our lamp-lit table in the central courtyard, where the fountain tinkled in the background to await the feast. Eat to much?, of course I did but the food tasted great then we had an impromptu Berber drum and singing performance by Lahcen and his friend.

What a great idea!