food bling photos - Morocco

I'd really love to have more photos up on my blog. Although I've got a pretty handy Canon SLR camera (it's a 450D for all you real photographers), I don't want to lug it with me into every restaurant. So most of the photos you'll find on the blog are taken with my phone. While my phone takes some decent photos, it's hopeless in low light (ie most restaurants).

As I'm currently enjoying a week at home with our first bub, I've been slowly trawling my way through the ridiculous amount of photos on my hard drive. I thought that surely there would have to be a few decent ones to throw up on the blog.

The first batch of photos come from our honeymoon in Morocco in 2007. We had an amazing 3 weeks in Morocco, and food played a huge part of the overall experience. It's hard to find a bad meal in Morocco, and even travelling on the Australian dollar it wasn't difficult to enjoy fantastic food.

The first two photos are of the Djemaa el Fna in Marrakech.

The Djemaa el Fna is the main square in Marrakech. Our riad in Marrakech was about 2 minutes walk to the Djemaa el Fna. At night time the Djemaa el Fna completely overloads your senses. It's impossible to give the full sense of the place on this blog, and these photos don't even start to do it justice. Just as it gets dark, hundreds of food stalls set up all over the square, serving all kinds of amazing Moroccan food. But it's not all just about the food - there are snake charmers, dancers, live music and these guys that tell amazing stories to huge crowds of people (I understand about 3 words of Arabic, but would listen to these incredibly theatrical story-tellers just for the entertainment and the reaction of the crowds).

As most Moroccans tend to eat dinner fairly late, we'd sit up on the roof of our riad in the early evening, wondering where we would end up for dinner. In the meantime, we'd hear constant drums and music from the square, see smoke rising in the air from all the ad-hoc restaurants and (best of all) smell the magical aromas of dinners being cooked for hundreds of Moroccans. As far as I'm concerned, visiting the Djemaa el Fna is one of the food (and sensory) highlights of the world.

To be perfectly frank, I have to admit that I got terribly sick in Marrakech, after eating at one of the restaurants in and around the Djemaa el Fna. Although I ended up not being able to eat or drink anything for two days, it will never deter me from eating with the locals. I'd rather end up sick for a couple of days than spending my holidays at the closest McDonalds.

The next photo doesn't include any food at all. But it's probably the most amazing setting in which I've ever been lucky enough to enjoy breakfast, anywhere on our travels.

This photo is the terrace at Madada Mogador in Essaouira, where we were served breakfast every morning. Our room actually opened up onto this terrace. We'd drag ourselves out of bed after a lazy sleep-in and walk out onto the terrace. What followed was a beautiful breakfast of fresh orange juice, yoghurt, fresh fruit, Moroccan pancakes, honey, jam, tea and coffee. As you can see, the terrace looked out over the whole of the bay that surrounds Essaouira. It was incredibly hard to actually get back out of the chair and leave - why would you bother with a view like this?

The last photo again lacks any actual food, but it's another table with an unbeatable view. This photo is the view from the terrace of Dar Mouna, our beautiful hotel in Ait Ben Haddou. Again we were lucky enough to eat breakfast from this terrace, admiring the view of an incredibly well preserved kasbah. Ait Ben Haddou is one of the most famous kasbahs in Morocco, which has been used as a background for films such as Lawrence of Arabia and Gladiator. In the foreground is the bed of the Ouarzazate River, which is almost always dry.

As a result of our honeymoon, Moroccan food will always stick with me. Morocco traverses the entire spectrum of food, from the absolute simplicity of fresh, tangy orange juice which is served with every meal, to the delicious complexities of a slow cooked tagine. Ever since we returned from Morocco, I've had a jar of preserved lemons in the fridge - such a simple ingredient, but such a distinctively Moroccan flavour. I'm yet to cook a tagine at home that approaches any that we had in Morocco, but I'm determined to keep trying! Hope you enjoy the photos, and I'll try to find a few more food related pictures soon.

Fallen Angel

When I was in Peru at the end of last year, I was fortunate to eat at some really memorable places. One of those was Fallen Angel in Cusco.

Generally speaking I tend to avoid restaurants full of tourists, as I'd much rather eat at a vaguely authentic place. But our guide had booked us in to Fallen Angel on the last night of our trip. As soon as we stepped through the door, we realised this was no regular restaurant. The fit-out was completely over the top. There were angels everywhere, murals, random verses painted on the walls, lots of glass and plenty of quirky decorations.


But our table turned out to be even better than the surroundings, because it was a fishtank. It looked like a really big old bath that been filled with brightly coloured fish, a few plants and covered with a thick sheet of glass. After we were shown to our table we spent the first few minutes just watching the fish. The next 5-10 minutes were then occupied by us all trying to get a good photo of the fish, which proved a bit tough (as you can see).


The menu covers salads, soups, pasta and steaks. Most of us opted for the 250 gram organic tenderloins, because we hadn't had too much luck finding a really good steak in Peru. The tenderloins came with loads of different sauces, including Chancacon (Colorado chilli and Peruvian molasses), Cool-antro (marinated in ginger, sugar and garlic and served with freshly chopped coriander) and basil, pepper and aniseed. Each of the steaks were 40 Soles (about $18), which is actually a pretty expensive meal in Peru.

I ordered a tenderloin with red wine and fresh rosemary, thinking that the steaks here should be good enough not to need too much in the way of sauce. All of the steaks were served with a side of rice, potatoes, potato rosti, veges or some very suggestive looking mashed potato (two small mounds of mashed potato, each topped with a pea).

My steak was ok, but not as good as the surroundings. It tasted like it had been stewed in a pan on low heat, but was tender, and the sauce complemented the steak well.

As it turned out, the non-steak dishes were the best. My wife enjoyed her yellow potato and red beetroot gnocchi. Not only did it have an amazing presentation, it tasted just as good as it looked. Although I didn't get to try it, one of our friends ordered a salad that was topped with rose petals - no half measures on presentation here.


If the steaks were a bit underwhelming, the cocktails made up for it - they were fantastic. The fruit cocktails were real standouts. We had spent a decent chunk of the afternoon at a pub watching Peru play a world cup qualifying game (which they lost), so the cocktails were going down well by this stage of the night. My original margarita was great, but not a patch on the passionfruit daiquiri, which was one of the most refreshing and tangy cocktails I've ever tried. It was such an amazing colour too.

The crazy design even extended to the toilets. There were only two, and although there was some bizarre symbol above each door, I had no idea which one was the gents. One of the toilets was decorated with barbed wire and roses, and the other had every centimetre of its walls covered in cracked mirrors. We all came back to the table and asked each other which loo we thought was the men's or ladies - it just added to the whole experience.

Although some of our food wasn't a standout, the decor and drinks make this a memorable place for a meal. Sure, no-one wants to eat a place like this every night when you're on holidays, but it was the perfect place to go for a last dinner with some great friends we had met on our trip, before we all headed back to various parts of the globe.

What does all this mean? Over the top decorations and amazing cocktails make this the perfect place to remind you that you're on holidays.

food bling ratings

Food - OK

Service - Good

Ambience - Amazing, over-the-top surroundings, with fish swimming around under your table

Value for Money - Good

Vegetarian - Good

Wine - Forget about wine for the night and drink the amazing cocktails instead

Fallen Angel

Plazoleta Nazarenas 221

Cusco Peru

E - fallenangelincusco@hotmail.com

W - http://fallenangelincusco.com/

Mice on Sticks

After my guinea pig post, I've been walking around trying to remember the weirdest street food that I've seen. Then I remembered mice on sticks. Pretty hard to beat that one.

When I was in Mozambique there was a kid on the side of the road selling mice on sticks. We stopped and bought a couple. Not surprisingly, no-one ate any of them.

I'd be keen to know the craziest street food everyone has come across - post up a comment on the weird and wonderful local foods you've eaten.

Guinea Pig

When you think of guinea pigs, the first thing that pops into your head is cute, fluffy things that little kids keep as pets. In Peru, guinea pigs (or cuy) are still cute and fluffy, but they're also considered to be something you cook up for dinner.

I'd read about eating guinea pig before heading off to Peru. I always like to try out as much local food as I can when travelling. Thinking I probably wouldn't come across guinea pig anywhere else in the world, I ordered cuy for dinner one night at a restaurant in Puno. One of my friends on the trip was crazy enough to order it as well. It was a modern, cool, upmarket type of restaurant, so we thought we'd be in safe hands.

After a bit of a wait, the guinea pig came out. It was served whole, flattened out on the plate and didn't look particularly appealing. We were getting looks from the other side of the table as if to say "are you really going to eat that?". The whole dining experience wasn't really optimised by one of our dinner party pointing out that you could still see the guinea pig's teeth.

My theory is that the restaurant staff bring the guinea pig out whole, just to get a bit of amusement in watching gringos like me try to eat it. After I'd had a bit of a go at it with my knife and fork, one of the waiters came over and asked if we'd like it cut into pieces. "Great idea" I thought.

Soon the guinea pig came back in more manageable pieces. It had been deep fried whole. Although I'd been told you were supposed to eat the skin, it was like lino and I would have been at the restaurant for the next week if I'd attempted to eat all the skin. The guinea pig on my plate was a pretty lean one, and there was hardly any meat on it at all. It didn't take long before we both gave up on the guinea pig and focused our attention on the vegetables on the plate, which were looking more mouth watering by the minute.

So the guinea pig didn't turn out to be a particularly filling meal and we headed off to the local supermarket late at night in an attempt to find a bit more dinner. Along with the enormous plate of tripe which I randomly ordered off a menu written in Swahili when I was in Nairobi, guinea pig is one of those local foods that I'm not in a big hurry to track down again. But I'd rather be trying guinea pig than lining up at the local McDonalds - it's all part of the travelling experience.

Peru Trip

Well I'm back from Peru after a brilliant holiday. The main reason we went to Peru was to walk the Inca trail and see Machu Picchu. Machu Picchu was of course amazing, but the rest of the country surprised me with its people, landscapes, culture and of course the food - all of which added up to a great trip.

I headed off to Peru with a bit of a stereotype in my head that all South American food revolved around chilli. That turned out to be way off the mark. Although chilli pops up in plenty of Peruvian food, it normally lends only a very mild flavour, rather than blowing your tastebuds out of your mouth.

The potato is the staple food in Peru, where they grow about 2000 different varieties (according to our local guides). Although some form of potato turns up as a side vegetable in pretty much every meal, there are some traditional dishes where the potato is the star, like ocopa (potatoes with a sauce made from chilli, walnuts/peanuts, huatacay and cheese), papa a la huancaina (sliced potatoes with a spicy cheese sauce) and causa (mashed potato with lemon, onion, chili and oil - often served with chicken, seafood or avocado).

Given the long coastline of Peru, seafood is also an important part of its cuisine. Lima is famous for cerviche, which is seafood marinated in lime juice, onions and chilli. The seafood isn't cooked - it's just served once the seafood has been marinated for the appropriate time. Cerviche is traditionally served with raw onion, boiled sweet potato and giant corn kernels. I had some fish cerviche in Lima, and it was delicious (see photo).


When it came to meat, I tried beef, chicken, duck, pork, alpaca and guinea pig (look out for the post on that one). Some of the traditional meat dishes are lomo saltado (slices of beef stir fried with with onion, tomato, soy sauce and chilli), arroz con pato (duck with coriander flavoured rice - see photo), papa rellena (potato stuffed with minced beef, egg and olives) and aji de gallina (chicken with a creamy spicy sauce).


We also came across some plants and cereals that I hadn't tried before - quinoa, kiwicha and kaniwa. Quinoa forms an important part of the locals' diet in the south of the country, especially around Lake Titicaca, where I had some delicious quinoa soups.

Peru has some fantastic desserts. My favourite was suspiro limeno, which is an incredibly sweet dessert made from condensed milk. It was so good I'm going to put up a separate post with the recipe. Other desserts include locally flavoured ice cream (like prickly pear or lucuma) and alfajores (small biscuits with a caramel filling).

Being a bit of a snack food addict, I was glad to find Peruvians shared my love of snacks. In every town there were snack stands on most corners, selling things like fried plaintain chips (my favourite snack in Peru), peanuts, Brazil nuts, crunchy fried corn kernels, biscuits and all kinds of chocolate bars. Most of these snacks cost 1 Sol (about 40 Australian cents) so I tried plenty of them.

Pisco sour is probably the most famous drink in Peru. Pisco is a grape brandy, made in Peru. Apparently Peru and Chile have an ongoing argument as to which country first made pisco. Anyway, the pisco sour is a cocktail made of pisco, lime juice, ice, sugar and egg white. It ends up as a fairly frothy cocktail and is served with a few drops of bitters or sometimes cinnamon (see photo). They taste great and plenty of restaurants would offer a free pisco sour to get you in the door. Now that I'm back in Brisbane, I'm on the hunt to track down a bottle of pisco. If you've seen any in your local bottleshop, please let me know.

We also got to try chicha, which is a home made corn beer (see photo). It tasted ok, although it's pretty filling. An enormous litre sized glass of chicha costs about 40 cents, so you can see why its popular with the locals. There's also a strawberry flavoured chicha for the ladies.

There are of course local beers (like Brahma, Cristal and Cusquena) and there is some wine made in Peru, although I didn't get to try any. My local drink of choice (when I wasn't drinking pisco sours) was Inca Kola.

Inca Kola, although called cola, is actually bright yellow and tastes like creaming soda. Not exactly what you'd expect from cola, but I was a big fan.

I also drank plenty of coca tea, especially at altitude. It's supposed to help out with altitude sickness. Generally it's made by just throwing a handful of coca leaves into hot water. Although they do grow some coffee in Peru, we had a hard time finding a good cup of fresh coffee. The hotels usually served this incredibly thick stuff, that was so strong it had to be diluted with lots of hot water and milk. One morning I made the mistake of pouring about a third of a cup of condensed milk into my coffee (thinking it was milk) only to end up with the sweetest coffee ever.

Of course there's no way I can do any justice to the amazing variety of Peruvian cuisine in one post, but hopefully this gives you some idea of the delicious food on offer in Peru. I've got a few more Peru posts in the pipeline, so keep your eyes out for those over the next week or so.