Marrakech, Morocco — Food and Dining
Restaurants in Marrakech, Morocco
Restaurants
Expensive
Casa Lalla
Every night the candlelit patio of the refined Riad Casa Lalla is transformed into a gastronomic getaway, where the French chef serves a menu invented that day with the freshest, most succulent ingredients from Marrakech's marketplace. The intimate setting among fellow foodies adds to the dining experience, but special tables can be arranged for couples. Reservations required.
16 Derb Jemaa, Medina
Tel: (0524) 429 757.
Website: www.casalalla.com
Comptoir Darna
Comptoir Darna is still the place to be seen and the favorite hang-out for Marrakech's beautiful people. Both cocktail bar and restaurant, Comptoir Darna segues from mellow dining downstairs to outbursts of belly-dancing and carousing by the upstairs bar as the night wears on. The Franco-Moroccan menu works well in this sumptuous, east-meets-west setting where diplomats, supermodels and minor royalty rub shoulders.
Avenue Echouada, Hivernage
Tel: (0524) 437 702.
Website: www.comptoirdarna.com
Dar Moha
The culinary star of Marrakech has set new standards for Moroccan fusion cuisine, with combinations dreamed up daily from the souks and the imagination of Chef Mohammed Fedal. Dar Moha's menu consists of sumptuous fix-priced feasts. The best seats in this former family home are around the petal-strewn pool in the garden, where musicians play in the evenings and a grill house emits tantalizing aromas by day. Reservations necessary. Serves alcohol.
81 Rue Dar el-Bacha
Tel: (0524) 386 400.
Website: www.darmoha.ma
La Maison Arabe
The restaurant of Marrakech's famed hotel offers a selection of traditional Moroccan dishes and local specialties, including a few vegetarian options. The restaurant has a plush interior with hand-painted woodwork and some tables spill over into the pretty, shaded courtyard. Good for lunch as well as dinner, but dinner is accompanied by excellent Arab-Andalusian music. Serves alcohol.
1 Derb Assehbe, Bab Doukkala, Medina
Tel: (0524) 387 010.
Website: www.lamaisonarabe.com
Moderate
Al Fassia
Al Fassia has become a local legend for hearty yet elegant dishes from the Middle Atlas and Fes. The restaurant is run by a group of sisters who recreate their own family recipes with top-notch ingredients and a sharp all-female staff. The menu is à la carte and the décor plush, modern Moroccan. A wide selection of savoury meat dishes, tagines and couscous are on offer, but the array of nine salads alone is enough to satisfy a vegetarian. Serves alcohol.
55 Boulevard Zerktouni (at end of pedestrian passage), Guéliz
Tel: (0524) 434 060.
Website: www.alfassia.com
Café du Livre
Tucked away in the Ville Nouvelle, Café du Livre is an inviting space away from the crowds. Appealing to expat tastes, this Marrakech restaurant offers French-flavored fare for lunch, tapas in the evening and big breakfasts all day. Bookworms and Wi-Fi fans will position themselves in front of the open fire during winter and never emerge.
44 Rue Tarik Ben Ziad
Tel: (0524) 432 149.
Website: www.cafedulivre.com
Le Grand Café de la Poste
Once a sorting office and colonial hotel, this deco Casablanca-style eatery is where Mediterranean flair meets top-notch Moroccan ingredients on the inventive seasonal à la carte menu. Among the potted palms in the dining room, ordinary mortals mingle with movie stars on a break from filming desert scenes. With ample vegetarian options, salads, and dishes light on the sauces, it's easy to justify dessert.
Boulevard El Mansour Eddahbi
Tel: (0524) 433 038.
Website: www.grandcafedelaposte.com
Terrasse des épices
Chic and sleek, the Terrasse des épices offers a smart space for meeting and eating north of Jemaa El Fna. Offering a tantalizing mix in Moroccan and continental cuisine it also tempts with a fabulous line in desserts. Dine alfresco or in attractive private nooks. Post-business, this is one of the city's liveliest spots at night.
15 Souk Cherifa, Sidi Abdelaziz
Tel: (0524) 375 904.
Website: www.terrassedesepices.com
Cheap
Café de France
A local institution and one of the most famous cafés in Marrakech, Café de France is popular as a meeting place for those with business in the medina. The street-level terrace is good for watching the comings and goings in the square, while the roof terraces have superb views. The menu offers unexceptional but serviceable fare and decent coffee at a reasonable price; what you're paying for here is the location and convenience factor.
Jemaa el Fna
Chez Chegrouni
A better option for delicate stomachs and vegetarians than the food stalls in the Jemaa el Fna but still within the square, Chez Chegrouni is a hugely popular restaurant with tourists and locals alike. It offers all the usual dishes and has a small terrace at the front to watch the nightly antics. Unlike many of the other budget restaurants in Marrakech, this place does not use meat stock for non-meat dishes, so vegetarian dishes are just that. Although it's small and basic, it's very clean and well run, and a justifiable favorite.
Jemaa el-Fna
Tel: (0665) 474 615.
Jemaa el Fna
For the most authentic Moroccan dining experience, join the crowds and eat within the Jemaa el Fna itself. As twilight falls, over 100 food stalls are set up and clouds of smoke drift over the square as all manner of meats are grilled and served with cooked vegetable salads as sides. Wander around until you see ingredients that look the freshest, then squeeze onto one of the benches. Bread is used instead of cutlery and orange juice is brought from one of the many juice stalls. A word of warning - although the food is well cooked, ask for food to be served on paper instead of hastily rinsed plates, and drink OJ from your water bottle instead of reused cups.
Jemaa-el-Fna
Pizzeria Venezia
Good selection of pizzas, pastas and salads, all made with the freshest ingredients, but the real draw is the view from the roof terrace. From here you can see the sun setting over the Koutoubia Mosque and watch the cars, bikes and pedestrians jostle along the busy avenue. Cool breezes on hot summer evenings make the experience even more pleasant.
279 Avenue Mohammed V
Tel: (0524) 440 081.
Nightlife
Marrakech has something of a reputation for its nightlife, which covers groovy Ibiza-style discos to belly-dancing. The medina provides traditional evening entertainment in the form of cafés, food stalls and street entertainment, with everything revolving around Jemaa el Fna.
Although Morocco is an Islamic country, there is a laid-back attitude towards alcohol, with bars in most tourist areas staying open late. In the medina, law and etiquette dictate that alcohol should not be consumed openly within view of a mosque, so drink discreetly indoors or on roof terraces.
Several hotels have rooftop cafés overlooking the square, while a number of riads have been converted into upmarket restaurants offering the full Moroccan experience, including a vast feast, music and entertainment.
For happening bars and clubs, head for Guéliz and Hivernage. Clustered along Avenue Mohammed V, particularly around place Abdel Moumen ben Ali, are most of the city's bars, as well as a wide variety of restaurants, bistros and sidewalk cafés. The city's best nightclubs are located in Hivernage hotels or in venues just outside town.
Bars
Café Arabe
In the medina, the choice is somewhat limited. The serpentine sofas on the roof of the Café Arabe inspire nights on the cocktails overlooking the mountains.
184 rue Mouassine
Tel: (0524) 429 728.
Website: www.cafearabe.com
Café-Bar de l'Escale
Guéliz has a much greater range of bars, though there's a fine line between characterful and outright seedy. The Café-Bar de l'Escale is the rare relaxed place where beers can be taken out to the pavement tables.
Rue Mauretania, off Avenue Mohammed V
Le Bar Churchill
All the big hotels also have bars. The most glamorous in the city is undoubtedly Le Bar Churchill, at La Mamounia hotel, which has a sumptuous Moorish and art deco interior and a strict dress code. It is named after the hotel's most famous guest and is the perfect place for an aperitif in jazzy 1930s style.
La Mamounia, Avenue Bab Jedid
Tel: (0524) 388 600.
Website: www.mamounia.com
Piano Bar Ouarzazi
The piano bar at the Jardins de la Koutoubia hotel has the requisite pianist who gamely plays requests, and provides the perfect place to sip cocktails by the pool.
Jardins de la Koutoubia, 26 Rue de la Koutoubia
Tel: (0524) 388 800.
Website: www.lesjardinsdelakoutoubia.com
Clubs
Diamant Noir
Although Marrakech has a reputation within Morocco for nightlife, clubs are an expensive extravagance where behavior doesn't conform to strictest Moroccan codes of propriety. Music tends to be a mixture of Western pop music, Moroccan hits and funky DJ mashups. The slightly camp Diamant Noir has an easy-going party atmosphere and a dance floor where straight and gay mix easily.
Hôtel le Marrakech, Place de la Liberté
Tel: (0524) 434 351.
Website: www.hotellemarrakech.com
Pacha Marrakech
Pacha Marrakech is the nightclub with the magnetic pull to attract DJs away from New York and Amsterdam and playboys and partiers from Casablanca and Ibiza, so on the right night you won't begrudge the taxi ride from town. The place has a capacity for thousands but during the week it echoes. At weekends you'll be lucky to squeeze in, even in your best club attire.
Boulevard Mohammed VI
Tel: (0524) 388 400.
Website: www.pachamarrakech.com/club
TéatrO
TéatrO, in the grounds of Hôtel Es Saadi, packs in the crowds for its Saturday DJ turn, where the clothes may be cool and monochromatic but the scene stays hot and colorful until dawn.
Hôtel Es Saadi, Rue Ibrahim El Mazini, Hivernage
Tel: (0664) 860 339.
Website: www.theatromarrakech.com
Live Music
African Chic
African Chic hosts live music nightly in Marrakech.
6 rue Oum Errabia, Guéliz
Tel: (0524) 431 424.
Website: www.african-chic.com
Jemaa el Fna
For all types of live music, the place to go is Jemaa el Fna. Sometimes you may also find a group playing in the grounds behind the Koutoubia Mosque on Avenue Mohammed V. The National Festival of Popular Arts, held over a week in July in open-air locations throughout the city, offers the chance to listen to a variety of Berber tribal music.
Jemaa el Fna, Medina
