The Souk, or market, was my favorite bit of Tangier. I love markets. They can range from down and dirty to outrageous sensory overload: this one was definitely in the latter category. Just look at that produce. I can't reproduce the spice scents wafting through the air, but you can imagine.
This is an olive vendor. These are all olives. Black olives, green olives, greeny green olives, orangy olives, reddish olives, spicy olives, canned olives, jarred olives. And poor Hope, who kept getting tossed into photos as a prop.
Tom genuinely like this, though. It's a cow tongue. Blessed huge things, aren't they?
Oh, it was great.
Morocco is know for a specialty dish called Tangine. The clay pot it is cooked in, with a pyramid shaped lid is also known as a a Tangine. This kind of easy to remember stuff is right up my alley. It's strikes me as a forerunner to the crock pot: you toss in all the good stuff, let it simmer just south of forever, and eat. "All the good stuff," includes but is not limited to: lamb or chicken with a medley of ingredients or seasonings like olives, quinces, apples, pears, apricots, raisins, prunes, dates, nuts, with Lemon, with or without honey, with or without a complexity of spices. Traditional spices that are used to flavor tagines include ground cinnamon, saffron, ginger, turmeric, cumin, paprika, and black pepper. Sounds tasty? It is.
My one failure in the souk was to bring back a tangine. I certainly could not replicate the Moroccan version in my own kitchen, but I could have looked rather spiffy while trying.
We had a nice tangine lunch at a local restaurant, and then moved on to the casbah. As you may already know, the term "casbah" refers to the walled fortress sections of many North African cities and towns. If you are interested, the song "Rock the Casbah," by the Clash sang refered specifically to the Algerian Casbah in Algiers, and was about Iran's outlawing of music. In the song, the local king (sharif) outlaws music, the people rebel, and they "rock the casbah."
Mohamed asked the children to pick up some rocks. And we took their pictures. Yes, this is the casbah. Yes, I am grateful to Mohamed for showing us the casbah - it might have been tricky to find it on our own - but, do people really enjoy this sort of thing? Worse, maybe we are just not fun people?? While he did not ask Jeff and I to pick up any rocks, I suspect it was our utter lack of interest in the whole children picking them up that led to to believe we might not be willing subjects.
But, the citadel was beautiful. And we could see Spain.
We spent some time wandering around the medina (the walled city).
It was fascinating to imagine how it has changed over the centuries.
And to see the things that hadn't changed. This is the local baker. All of the woman in the neighborhood make their own bread dough, but it is all baked by this fellow, who runs his ovens all day long. He has a system for keeping each household's bread clearly marked. The baker is a central figure in any neighborhood. He knows who is sick, who is looking to get married, who is pregnant: you need something, ask the baker. He's the go-to guy who knows everything that is going on in the neighborhood.
We ended our day serenaded by Mohamed's pals at a touristic restaurant.
Overall, a pleasant day.
I love markets as well. The first photo is beautiful! I'd be afraid to touch anything. I don't see any durians. ;)
The alleys remind me of an Indian Jones movie.
Posted by: Debbie Hanson | October 29, 2011 at 07:21 PM