Chez Mado

Morocco's European kitchens trace three distinct lineages. French Morocco, inherited from the Protectorate, runs on bistros and brasseries serving steak frites, duck confit, coquilles Saint-Jacques, plateau de fruits de mer, and a wine list built around French and Moroccan bottles. The best versions in Casablanca and Rabat read like neighbourhood brasseries in Lyon or Paris — short menus, white tablecloths, cheese trolleys, and a maître d'hôtel who actually greets tables.

Italian cooking in Morocco skews Neapolitan for pizza and Roman for pasta. Wood-fired Neapolitan pies with San Marzano tomatoes and fior di latte are a legitimate part of the Moroccan dining map now, especially in Marrakech and Casablanca. Pastas — cacio e pepe, carbonara, gnocchi al pomodoro, seafood linguine — are almost universally handmade in the good places. Italian wine lists and amaros have quietly become part of the upscale Moroccan bar scene as well.

At the fine-dining end, the vocabulary is Mediterranean more than strictly one nation: burrata with local tomatoes, grilled octopus with preserved lemon aioli, lamb with couscous jus, tajine-style braises served in porcelain. The best Moroccan chefs working in this register use the country's ingredients — saffron, argan oil, preserved lemon, sardines, goat, quince — inside a French or Italian technique frame. The tasting menus worth the money do not feel like European cooking imported; they feel like Morocco translated into a second language.

A word on ordering and pacing. Moroccan meals are built to be long and shared. Starters — olives, small salads, bread, sometimes a soup — arrive on their own clock, and rushing them short-changes the meal. Mint tea, strong and sweet, almost always closes the table. Tipping is expected at sit-down places; 10 percent on top of a bill that already includes service is a safe baseline. Ask the room what they would order if they were choosing for a friend, and you will almost always be pointed at the real house dish rather than the one printed largest on the menu. That single question, asked politely, is the shortest route to eating well in any Moroccan dining room.