What Kind of Bread Do I Serve With Moroccan Food?

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Your choices for bread to serve with a Moroccan meal are varied, but serving some kind is a must because in Morocco bread appears on the table at almost every meal. Breads help soak up juices from spicy lamb or eggplant tangines flavored with cumin, cinnamon, saffron and preserved lemon. Moroccans also use flatbreads to pick up chunks of meat or vegetables, as dips for sauces and as pockets and wraps for salads.

An Everyday Choice

Fresher and softer than the pita bread you'll find in stores, "khobz," the Moroccan name for the commonplace white or wheat rounds, is still the same flatbread that Americans know as pita or pocket bread. Making fresh pita bread yourself adds an authentic touch to your Moroccan meal. If you do that, you can also try some khobz variations, such as working chopped black olives into the dough or pricking the dough with a fork as the rounds bake so they don't form the typical pocket.

Street Bread

Named after a city in northern Morocco, Tangier street bread is made with an egg, chickpea flour, olive oil, salt and water. It is flat like pita but resembles a crepe or pancake more than it does traditional bread. That said, Moroccans eat it as bread, either sprinkled with spices or topped with a spicy paste called harissa. For your Moroccan meal, serve the street bread with a hummus spread as an appetizer or alongside a salad or soup.

Moroccan "Bagels"

Though they are not called bagels and are never dropped into boiling water like bagels, "kahk," or savory bracelets, look very much like bagels but are crisp all the way through. Kahk are sometimes made with sugar and eaten like cookies, but Moroccans typically add allspice and chili powder to a savory dough. Make your own kahk by slicing bagels into thick layers, spraying them with cooking spray, sprinkling them with spices and baking them in the oven until crisp.

Semolina for All

Many Moroccan and North African breads use semolina flour along with white or wheat flours. Made from a coarse grind of Durum wheat, semolina is high in protein and adds flavor and a golden color to breads. Substitute all or some of the regular flour in any bread recipe to turn give it a Moroccan flair. Or serve semolina pancakes called begrhir, drizzled with honey and butter as a dessert to your Moroccan meal.