Moroccan Desserts & Pastries to Try

The pastries you will encounter most are chebakia (sesame-honey spirals), kaab el ghazal (almond-paste gazelle horns), briouats (fried filo parcels), ghriba (crumbly shortbread biscuits) and fekkas (twice-baked almond biscuits). M'hanncha (almond snake cake) is the classic special-occasion centrepiece. None of them are Western-dessert sweet — most rely on honey, almond paste and orange-blossom rather than refined sugar as the primary flavour, giving them a floral, nutty character that feels restrained compared to, say, baklava.

Chebakia is a sesame-dough pastry folded into a flower or lattice shape, deep-fried and immediately soaked in warmed honey, then coated in sesame seeds. It has a honeycomb crunch outside and a chewy centre. It is the defining food of Ramadan in Morocco — families eat it with harira soup at the evening breaking-of-fast (iftar) every night of the holy month. You can find it year-round at Djemaa el-Fna in Marrakech and in medina pastry stalls, but the quality and freshness peaks during Ramadan when demand is highest and batches are made daily.

Less sweet than you might expect. Moroccan pastries use natural sweeteners — primarily honey and dates — alongside almond paste scented with orange-blossom water or rosewater, which means the dominant flavour is floral and nutty rather than sugar-forward. Sellou, for example, tastes almost savory to some palates because of the anise and aged butter. The sweetest items tend to be the honey-soaked ones (chebakia, briouats) rather than the baked almond pastries. If you are cautious about sugar, ghriba and fekkas are the mildest options.

The best purchases happen at neighbourhood patisseries (look for glass display cases and a local clientele), not in tourist-facing riad restaurants or souvenirs shops. In Marrakech, the Mellah (Jewish quarter) has historic confectionery shops near the spice market. In Casablanca, the Habous quarter's Pâtisserie Bennis is a benchmark operation. In Fes, look for almond confectionery stalls inside Bab Bou Jeloud. Essaouira has distinctive argan-oil ghriba from mellah bakeries. Prices in all these spots run 30–60% below what hotel riads charge for the same items.

Ramadan produces the richest pastry culture in Morocco. Chebakia is the essential Ramadan sweet — eaten every night at iftar alongside harira soup. Sellou (the dense flour-almond-sesame confection) appears because of its sustained energy during the fasting day. Briouats in both sweet and savoury versions fill platters for iftar gatherings. Dates are technically a Ramadan staple rather than a pastry, but quality Medjool and Mejhoul dates from Tafilalet and Zagora are worth buying. If you visit during Ramadan, staying up for the post-iftar street food scene around 9–10 pm is one of the most vivid food experiences Morocco offers.

Yes, but some travel better than others. Fekkas (twice-baked biscuits) and ghriba (dry shortbread) survive a long-haul flight in good condition and have a shelf life of 2–3 weeks. Kaab el ghazal and m'hanncha last 5–7 days if kept dry and cool. Honey-soaked pastries like chebakia and briouats go soggy within a day or two and are best eaten in-country. Ask patisseries to vacuum-pack (sous vide) or box tightly; most can do this on request. UK and US customs generally allow commercial-standard packaged baked goods, but check current rules on honey-coated items — liquid honey can trigger restrictions.

Yes — amlou is the most famous. It is a thick paste of toasted almonds, argan oil and honey, with a texture somewhere between peanut butter and tahini, eaten by dipping bread into a shallow bowl of it at breakfast. It is not quite a dessert and not quite a condiment, but it is one of the most distinctive Moroccan flavours you can try. Ghriba biscuits in Essaouira are sometimes made with argan oil in place of butter, giving them a distinctive earthy-nutty base note. Argan oil has a low smoke point so it is used cold in both cases, preserving its hazelnut flavour.