cooking class under the banana trees

An enthusiastic and colorful crew on the way to the local vegetable market, to buy fresh ingredients for the cooking workshop, armed with baskets and Arabic shopping lists.

Upon return to the riad everyone gets a cooking apron for the cooking class under the banana trees on the patio, led by chef Nadia and interpreter Fatiha.

Cutting, grinding, peeling, rolling, stirring, cooking, baking, tasting, zesting and meanwhile taking notes in the green little cooking notebook. Well, preparing a Moroccan lunch is a serious matter.
At the same time it starts to smell delicious on the patio of Chambres d'Amis.

While the other dishes are slowly cooking, the sweet desserts are being prepared and the table on the roof terrace is set.

Applause for the whole team and bon appetit! Time to enjoy a delightful, healthy home cooked meal. A feast for all senses!

winter vegetables

We like to eat seasonally.

Tonight on the menu; roasted winter vegetables.

Super simple, healthy, tasty and easy to make with everything from the vegetable drawer.

Chioccia- and yellow beets, chicory, red onions and a mini cauliflower.

A colorful composition of sliced vegetables, before they go into the oven. Feast for the eyes.

Preheat the oven to 220 degrees Celsius. Place the various vegetables in the oven dish. Mix some olive oil with garlic, pepper, salt and herbs and drizzle the oil mixture over the vegetables.

Place the dish in the middle of the oven and roast the vegetables for about 15-20 minutes.

A delicious basic dish that you can actually combine with anything.

marvelous marrakech 2021 - travel workshops in may & october

Marvelous Marrakech! Seven days in Marrakech with a distinctive workshops program.

Explore Marrakech every day in a different way. We have combined new places and topics with the best of our programs from previous years.

What's Marvelous Marrakech about? An immersive travel, creative & culinary experience to sate your wanderlust.

We will stay at Hotel Chambres d’Amis, an oasis in the Medina, located just a stone’s throw away from the beating heart of old Marrakesh, the Djma el Fna Square and the Souks! Despite this, it’s as quiet here as if you’re in the countryside, greenery and birds all over the place. We want you to feel at home in this green oasis, right in the middle, but far away from it all. Chambres d'Amis is exclusively reserved for participants during this retreat. This intimate, week-long retreat will be open to only 12 guests. You will stay there with an international group of women, from all over the world.

We have composed a week-long retreat with a different theme every day, the perfect way to explore Marrakech in an authentic, special and unique way.

Let’s get away together for an entire week to recharge, with relish and delight for a slow living, creative escape!

The longer stay is designed to provide you with ample time to explore your creative goals, soak up the red city, get to know your fellow travelers and find down time to recharge or explore on your own. This promises to be a transformative, once-in-a-lifetime journey. The Marvelous Marrakech retreat is a unique opportunity to be both restored and inspired.

Off the beaten tracks with workshops and exciting adventures while discovering Marrakech and surroundings. Where everyone else goes to the right we go to the left. By showing you the real Marrakech, your visit to the Red City will be a much more precious experience!

Price € 795,00 per person (excl. tourist tax € 2,50 pppn)

The price is based on a shared twin bedroom and excluding flight tickets.

INCLUDED:
- transfer from airport Marrakech to Riad Chambres d'Amis (v.v.)
- shared twin bedroom (6 nights) including breakfast in Chambres d'amis.
- 2 dinners & 5 lunches (drinks are not included)
- 4 workshops and a daytrip to the desert

CRAFT-WORKSHOP
Buying wool, cotton and yarns in the souk. Moroccan craft class in the open on the colourful Place des Epices, where Aisha will teach you different characteristic Moroccan craft techniques (materials are included). After lunch we will continue the Moroccan craft class with Aisha and practice different crochet and embroidery techniques in The Secret Garden. (Needless to say, I will give a crochet class aswell.) At the end of the afternoon we will visit the Carpet auction in the souk, an unforgettable and colorful experience.

GARDENS WORKSHOP
During the workshop we will visit and explore all kinds of gardens in and around Marrakech; an Arabic garden, a botanical garden, secret city gardens, hidden courtyards, an art garden, museum gardens and vegetable- and herb gardens.

INSTAGRAM-PHOTO WORKSHOP
Street photography in the medina. Learn how to anticipate the moment, to identify locations with suitable subjects and develop confidence in photographing on the street. Learn to select and frame a moving subject and explore color to create impact. A visit and lunch at Maison de la Photographie.

VEGGIE COOKING WORKSHOP & BERBER CARPETS
Vegetable shopping on the locals markets in the Medina and souk. Cooking class by Moroccan women under the banana trees at Chambres d'Amis. Home cooked lunch on the rooftop terrace.

A DAYTRIP TO THE DESERT
A daytrip to a the desert with a fabulous Moroccan lunch in the shade of a berber tent. Imagine a charming bivouac with a couple of berber tents and a view to completely unwind. You don’t often find yourself at such magical surroundings that it makes you wonder… Is this a movie set? The light, changing skies and views are astonishing! A day in the Agafay desert is a great way to experience the Moroccan desert without having to travel too far!

DAY OFF
Halfway the week we have planned a day off! We can suggest a visit to the luxurious Beldi Club, a visit to Jardin Majorelle and Yves Saint Laurent Museum or you can use the day for shopping in the souk (optionally with personal shopper). This week is a real treat for travellers, who would like to discover the real and authentic Marrakech. An adventurous journey, you can make on your own, while you will be 'pampered' and only have to enjoy and relax.

7 DAYS IN MARRAKECH MAY 2021
Arrival : Wednesday 19th of May 2021
Leaving : Tuesday 25th of May 2021


7 DAYS IN MARRAKECH OCTOBER 2021
Arrival : Wednesday 6th of October 2021
Leaving : Tuesday 12th of October 2021
The workshop will start with a welcome dinner on the rooftop of Chambres d'Amis at 7PM on Wednesday. For early arrivals Chambres d'Amis can offer you a small program on the first day.

Each morning will start with a traditional Moroccan breakfast on the roof terrace at our base camp Chambres d'Amis.

If you would like to join one of the workshops, please send an e-mail info@woodwoolstool.com
I will send you an application form and more information about the travel workshop.

The Marrakech travel workshop 2020 is a collaboration with Ank van der Pluijm, my friend and owner of hotel CHAMBRES D'AMIS, oasis in the Medina of Marrakech and our wonderful green 'basecamp' during the workshops week. You will, of course, be overloaded with impressions in Marrakesh, and Hotel Chambres d’Amis will be your quiet home to return to. Our street Derb Moulay Abdelkader is located in a very quiet and safe residential area, and very easy to find.

It is possible to book extra nights, before or after the workshop (info@chambresdamis.com)

home-grown aubergine recipe

For dinner we had home-grown aubergine from the oven with curry, walnuts and honey.

A very simple vegetarian recipe for a quick surprise dinner. It looks exotic and oriental and has a very special taste.

Combine an aubergine with curry, walnuts and honey to get a real taste explosion. It takes only 10 minutes to prepare and the oven does the rest of the work. Serve it as a starter, side dish or lunch.

Ingredients for 2 people:

- 2 aubergines
- walnuts
- 2 cloves of garlic
- olive oil
- honey
- lemon juice
- curry
- salt
- black pepper

Preparation time: 10 minutes
Oven time: 1 hour

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Wash the aubergines, pat them dry and cut them lengthwise into thin slices and put them in a greased baking dish.

Brush the aubergines with olive oil and drizzle the honey and lemon juice over the top. Cut the garlic cloves into slices and divide them over the tops.

Finally, walnuts, curry, pepper and salt over the aubergines and put the baking tin in the oven. Bake the aubergines for about 1 hour. Keep a close eye on the aubergines during that time. If they get too brown on top, cover them with aluminum foil.

Meanwhile set the table attractively, because with a nicely set table, everything tastes even better!

PS: Last week I made a Moroccan Zaalouk salad with the first harvested aubergines.

sabich

How to cure wanderlust when you can't travel?

Well as long as we can't travel, we can still cook and fill the kitchen with delicious scents that evoke a feeling of travel.

Yesterday I cooked Sabich, a simple and delicious veggie dish from the Neni Tel Aviv cookbook.

marvelous marrakech - cooking under the banana trees

Piles of freshly harvested vegetables proudly displayed and no waste here. Organic fruits and vegetables in abundance on the local market.

In the morning we went veggie shopping in the medina with our arabic-french shopping list.
Back in the riad with baskets full of fresh ingredients, chef Rachida was ready to show us the tricks of the moroccan cuisine on the patio in the shade of the banana trees.

With help from Rachida and a bunch of lovely assistant cooks, dressed in adorable kitchen aprons, we made ourselves a delicious Moroccan lunch.

And Mohamed showed us how to prepare a pomegranate, without getting even one tiny red spot on his shirt.

Plenty of delicious food! More than enough for lunch and dinner, we cooked for a crowd.

Furthermore we invited Aisha for a moroccan crochet workshop and to join us for lunch on the roof terrace at Chambres d'Amis.

The home-cooked-finger-licking-good lunch was a feast!