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Amazigh Foodways of Morocco

Indigenous

⚠ FILED UNDER THE EXISTING AMAZIGH ROOT AND NOT UNDER "MOROCCAN", because the Amazigh are the indigenous people of North Africa and predate every state in it. Tamazight is an official language of Morocco alongside Arabic since 2011, written in TIFINAGH, and is not one language: TASHELHIT in the Souss, Anti-Atlas and western High Atlas; CENTRAL ATLAS TAMAZIGHT in the Middle and eastern High Atlas; TARIFIT in the Rif; with GHOMARA and SENHAJA DE SRAIR as smaller northern varieties. ⚠ SO THERE IS NO SINGLE "AMAZIGH CUISINE" AND THIS ROW DOES NOT ASSERT ONE. What is shared is a way of eating rather than a menu: BARLEY before wheat, and barley couscous and the barley gruels; TAGINE and the slow clay pot; the communal dish eaten from the rim inward with the right hand; sheep and goat and their dairy — buttermilk, and SMEN, the aged salted butter; AMLOU of argan oil, almond and honey in the Souss; TAGULLA and ASIDA, the barley porridges; MEDFOUNA, the stuffed bread of the oases; TAFARNOUT, bread baked on hot stones; wild greens and thyme; honey; and dates where palms grow. ⚠ AND THE AGADIR — the communal fortified granary — is an Amazigh food institution: collective storage, with written rules, which is a documented social technology and not merely a building.

Atlas — where and when

Where in the world

Communities and languages

  • Amazigh community documented
  • Ishelhin community documented
  • Rifians community documented

Languages: Tachelhit, Central Atlas Tamazight, Tarifit, Ghomara, Senhaja de Srair

What is recorded

  • Tamazight has been an official language of Morocco alongside Arabic since 2011 and is written in Tifinagh. It is recorded as several languages, not one: Tashelhit in the Souss and Anti-Atlas, Central Atlas Tamazight in the Middle and eastern High Atlas, Tarifit in the Rif, with Ghomara and Senhaja de Srair as smaller northern varieties. No single Amazigh cuisine is asserted. Barley precedence over wheat, the clay tagine, communal eating from a shared dish, aged salted smen, amlou of argan and almond, barley porridges, medfouna and stone-baked tafarnout are documented. The agadir, a communal fortified granary with written rules, is recorded as a food institution. documented

Related foodways

This foodway relates to

  • part of Amazigh Foodways documented

    ⚠ The indigenous people of North Africa, predating every state in it. Filed under the Amazigh root, not under a national cuisine.

  • related to Western Desert Oasis Foodways documented

    Siwi is the easternmost Berber language; the Amazigh world runs from the Atlantic to that oasis.

Recorded as relating to this foodway

  • related to Argan, Saffron, Olives and Dates documented

    ⚠ Argan grows wild in one place on earth, and the work is overwhelmingly done by Amazigh women. Culinary argan is roasted; cosmetic argan is not.

Recipes

No recipes are filed under this cuisine yet.