26 April 2014 - MasterChef Travel

MasterChef comes to Marrakech, Daily Telegraph
26 April 2014
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The Daily Telegraph
Keri Moss gets to
grips with some
fresh ingredients
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arrakesh and I have
history. I spent a
few days there, half
a decade ago, and
returned home half
enchanted, half bruised. I loved
the verve and bustle, the brightly
coloured pottery, the vividly
flavoured food and the exquisite
architecture, but I was frustrated
by the sense that I was missing
too much, in part owing to my
inability to read or speak Arabic
(French works, but not always), in
part because the culture is hard
to decode. I was exhausted too,
by trying to buy the covetable
pottery in the souk, and needing
an hour of haggling to bring it
down from Knightsbridge prices
to something tourist-appropriate.
Add to that the aggressive self-
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appointed “guides” on every
corner trying to extract payment
for unwanted advice, turning
from charming to abusive at the
drop of a fez, and I was, let’s say,
ambivalent about the Red City.
So when I heard that this
year the MasterChef brand has
branched into travel, with
trips to the foodie hotspots of
the world including Mexico,
Thailand and, yes, Morocco, I
was intrigued. And before you
ask, there’s no Gregg or John on
the tours, but I can’t be the only
one who’d be quite relieved by
that – “holidays don’t get tougher
than this” would grate after a bit.
Instead, each tour is
accompanied by a bona fide
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For more press information please email press.office@mastercheftravel.co.uk
MasterChef comes to Marrakech, Daily Telegraph
26 April 2014
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TELEGRAPH TRAVEL | Saturday, April 26, 2014
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Saturday, April 26, 2014 | TELEGRAPH TRAVEL
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Saturday, April 26, 2014 | TELEGRAPH TRAVEL
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MasterChef contestant, so there’s a
good chance of behind-the-scenes
gossip along with the culinary
know-how. At the same time the
tour directors have been careful to
include enough sightseeing and free
time to keep less foodie partners
happy. But could they make me
fall in love with Marrakesh anew?
From the moment we arrived
at our small, traditional hotel, a
riad in the old city, just across
the street from a royal palace, it
seemed we were on to a winner. We
were greeted with exquisite little
Moroccan pastries and sweet mint
tea – Morocco is not the place to go
sugar-free – which we sipped sitting
in the cool, dimly lit courtyard. The
riad Dar les Cigognes – Place of the
Storks – is a haven of calm, despite
the thrum of motorbikes and the
rattle of horse-drawn carts outside,
and a reassuring blend of traditional
and luxurious. It’s the sort of place
where roses float in courtyard
fountains and every night there is a
poem on your pillow and milk and
cookies on the bedside table. I’m
not the only one to enjoy it – Yotam
Ottolenghi stayed here when he
filmed the Moroccan section of his
Mediterranean Feasts series. The
Amalfi coast
Seven days from £1,960 per
person, departing on
October 5, 7 or 9, with Sara
Danesin Medio, MasterChef UK
finalist in 2011. Includes visits
to buffalo mozzarella and
limoncello producers, wine and
olive tastings, plus tours of
Pompeii and Paestum.
} Spain: Culinary passion
hotel’s owner, Eben Lenderking,
a rangy, red-haired AngloAmerican, acted as food adviser.
That evening we sat on the roof
terrace tasting high-class Moroccan
wines while watching the sun
set over the palace walls. Each of
the riad’s turrets is topped with
a stork’s nest, hence its name.
Pierre, the soigné hotel manager,
whose career has included five-star
establishments, said: “You know, the
storks have just one partner for their
entire life,” before adding with a
toss of his head, “I am not a stork.”
Keri Moss, joint winner of
MasterChef: The Professionals in
2012, joined us for dinner under the
stars, a feast of tagine, quail and
couscous. She chatted happily about
her MasterChef experiences – the
terror of waiting for the swing doors
to open and the judges to walk
through, what it’s like to be at the
mercy of Michel Roux, how her final
creation went wrong – but she’s far
too discreet to dish any real dirt.
On the subject of the local
ingredients or cooking with the
hotel’s traditional cook, Fouzia,
however, she lit up. Some of the
ingredients, it has to be said, are
not for the fainthearted: we gasped
over stories of years-old fermented
butter, part of the traditional
Berber woman’s trousseau, and
} Turkey: Legacy
of the Ottomans
Five days from £1,195 per
person, departing on
September 10, 11 or 12, with
Keri Moss, joint winner of
MasterChef: The Professionals
(2012). Includes a visit to a
tea house, and to the Blue
Mosque, Hagia Sophia and
Topkapi Palace.
MasterChef Travel (020 7873
5005; mastercheftravel.co.uk),
which has a four-night trip to
Marrakesh, joined by Keri Moss,
the joint winner of MasterChef: The
Professionals 2012, from £1,395 per
person including flights, transfers,
excursions and accommodation
with breakfast each day and
some lunches and dinners.
} MasterChef Travel also offers
culinary tours, accompanied by
various MasterChef finalists, to
China, India, Italy, Mexico, Spain,
Thailand, Turkey and Vietnam.
Amalfi coast
Seven days from £1,960 per
person, departing on
October 5, 7 or 9, with Sara
Danesin Medio, MasterChef UK
finalist in 2011. Includes visits
to buffalo mozzarella and
limoncello producers, wine and
olive tastings, plus tours of
Pompeii and Paestum.
} Spain: Culinary passion
of the Basques
Six days from £1,895 per
person, departing on
October 10, 12 or 14, with Ash
Mair, winner of MasterChef:
The Professionals (2011).
Includes cider and wine
tastings, an introduction to
pintxos, plus tours of San
Sebastián and Bilbao.
a 12ft-long paddle to whisk the
flat, circular loaves, marked with
dimples to identify them, in and out
of the wood-burning oven. I would
never have found this on my own.
We headed back to the bustle of
the Djemaa el-Fna, where in the
evening a mini-Soho of stalls springs
up selling food to foreigners, while
snake charmers and water
sellers pose for photographs. But
we didn’t stop – this is tourist
territory. Our goal was the stall
in the corner, where a surly man
sold us tubs of fermented butter,
fragrant as blue cheese and laced
with fragments of dried beef. “It’s
amazing,” Lenderking promised.
Back at the hotel it was time
to cook. With Fouzia and Keri
we cooked ouarka (pronounced
} Turkey: Legacy
of the Ottomans
Five days from £1,195 per
person, departing on
September 10, 11 or 12, with
Keri Moss, joint winner of
MasterChef: The Professionals
(2012). Includes a visit to a
tea house, and to the Blue
Mosque, Hagia Sophia and
Topkapi Palace.
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of the Basques
Six days from £1,895 per
person, departing on
October 10, 12 or 14, with Ash
Mair, winner of MasterChef:
The Professionals (2011).
Includes cider and wine
tastings, an introduction to
pintxos, plus tours of San
Sebastián and Bilbao.
} Xanthe Clay travelled with
} Italy: Glories of the
} China: Oriental odyssey
Thirteen days from £3,545 per
person, departing October 9,
11 or 13, with Larkin Cen,
finalist in MasterChef UK
(2013). Includes a
demonstration at Hutong
Cuisine Cookery School, and
visits to the Great Wall and the
Terracotta Warriors in Xian.
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OC@M@DN<KJ@HJI
TJPMKDGGJR
} India: Splendours
of the north
Nine days from £2,315 per
person, departing on
October 8, 14 or 16, with
Dhruv Baker, winner of
MasterChef UK (2010).
Includes a Rajasthani dinner
at a former maharaja’s palace
and a street-food tour of
Old Delhi, plus a visit to the
Taj Mahal and Agra Fort.
T
TRAVEL
ONLINE
Video from
Marrakesh
} For details, see
mastercheftravel.com
gossiped about whether we were
game enough to try camel.
The next two days brought more
revelations. Lenderking, who
has lived part-time in Marrakesh
since he bought Dar les Cigognes
on a whim in 2000, acted as our
guide. A self-confessed food
obsessive, he turned out to be the
tour’s secret weapon, a one-man
Larousse Gastronomique of Morocco,
someone who has been known to
follow locals bearing food back
to their homes and knock on the
door to ask with characteristic
charm if he can try their dishes.
Lenderking led us through the
streets of the old city, showing us
a neat shortcut through the public
baths, where to eat the best local
slow-cooked stew “tangia” (up a set
of steps behind a stall stacked with
sheep’s heads), and how to make
it through the souk unhassled. The
secret, apparently, is to answer the
hawkers with a briskly polite “pas
Clockwise from top:
the Djemaa el-Fna; in
the souk; the Red City
is alive with music;
there’s a huge choice
of spices; Xanthe Clay
takes a photocall with
Eben Lenderking;
Xanthe takes up the
‘MasterChef’ challenge
aujourd’hui,” “not today,” which is
code for “I might look European
but I’m a local; don’t bother me.”
Moroccan spices are one of the
best souvenirs for a cook, but it is
easy to go wrong with unscrupulous
traders, or simply become befuddled
by the vast choice. Lenderking
showed us the best spice shop,
the wholesaler where the souk
stalls go to buy supplies, and
talked us through the stock, some
familiar, some baffling – such as
SIME/GETTY IMAGES
} Italy: Glories of the
“nutmeg of the Sahara”, dried
pomegranate skins and smellingsalts-strong eucalyptus resin – and
all unlabelled. We drank cups of
tea scented with star anise and
watched while the owner climbed
nimbly over boxes to reach the
shelves that stretched to the ceiling,
packed with aphrodisiacs, beauty
scrubs and herbal medicines.
Making purchases was easy:
as Lenderking’s a regular there
was no need to bargain. We
bought argan oil, a sublime and
expensive Moroccan nut oil, for
an astoundingly good value £8
a bottle, as well as bags of the
spice mix ras el hanout, and real
saffron at knock-down prices.
We were taught how to be sure it
was real saffron, by taking a single
strand, dampening it and rubbing
it on our palms. “If it goes orange,
it is fake. True saffron turns your
skin yellow,” our guide explained.
As we strolled out with our bags,
women walked purposefully past
us carrying trays covered with
clean cloths. Lenderking eyed
them expertly and said: “This is
bread, those are pies and these
ones are cookies.” He dived off
down a narrow alley, and up a set
of semolina-strewn steps to lead us
through an unmarked doorway to
the mosque-run bakery, where for
one dirham – about 8p – locals can
come and have their home-made
goods baked. A man expertly used
Watch Xanthe
Clay’s video
diary of her
culinary journey
through the Red
City, produced
by VistaBee for
Telegraph Travel
telegraph.co.uk/
marrakeshvideo
warka), a tissue-paper-thin pastry
that is a key ingredient in dishes
such as bstilla, a delectable spiced
pigeon or chicken pie. Then Saida,
Fouzia’s colleague, showed us
how to roll couscous, rubbing the
palms of our hands over a huge
dish of semolina and flour until the
characteristic fine clumps form.
Taking it in turns to help,
we watched her make a sevenvegetable couscous dish,
steaming the couscous three
times to make it super light.
“When Yotam Ottolenghi came,
he baked the couscous. They
were scandalised, but it worked
beautifully,” Lenderking confided.
Keri was no less revolutionary,
taking the intense, butter-soaked
dried beef and mixing it with
cucumber and a fragrant orange
zest and harissa dressing. It
was delicious, like a spicy beef
jerky salad. We ate the dishes
at the long table on the terrace,
and gossiped over our new
discoveries. Holidays, I reflected,
don’t get better than this.
} China: Oriental odyssey
Thirteen days from £3,545 per
person, departing October 9,
11 or 13, with Larkin Cen,
finalist in MasterChef UK
(2013). Includes a
demonstration at Hutong
Cuisine Cookery School, and
visits to the Great Wall and the
Terracotta Warriors in Xian.
} India: Splendours
of the north
Nine days from £2,315 per
person, departing on
October 8, 14 or 16, with
Dhruv Baker, winner of
MasterChef UK (2010).
Includes a Rajasthani dinner
at a former maharaja’s palace
and a street-food tour of
Old Delhi, plus a visit to the
Taj Mahal and Agra Fort.
mastercheftravel.com
T
SIME/GETTY IMAGES
aujourd’hui,” “not today,” which is
code for “I might look European
but I’m a local; don’t bother me.”
Moroccan spices are one of the
best souvenirs for a cook, but it is
easy to go wrong with unscrupulous
traders, or simply become befuddled
by the vast choice. Lenderking
showed us the best spice shop,
the wholesaler where the souk
stalls go to buy supplies, and
talked us through the stock, some
familiar, some baffling – such as
} Xanthe Clay travelled with
MasterChef Travel (020 7873
5005; mastercheftravel.co.uk),
which has a four-night trip to
Marrakesh, joined by Keri Moss,
the joint winner of MasterChef: The
Professionals 2012, from £1,395 per
person including flights, transfers,
excursions and accommodation
with breakfast each day and
some lunches and dinners.
} MasterChef Travel also offers
culinary tours, accompanied by
various MasterChef finalists, to
China, India, Italy, Mexico, Spain,
Thailand, Turkey and Vietnam.
a 12ft-long paddle to whisk the
flat, circular loaves, marked with
dimples to identify them, in and out
of the wood-burning oven. I would
never have found this on my own.
We headed back to the bustle of
the Djemaa el-Fna, where in the
evening a mini-Soho of stalls springs
up selling food to foreigners, while
snake charmers and water
sellers pose for photographs. But
we didn’t stop – this is tourist
territory. Our goal was the stall
in the corner, where a surly man
sold us tubs of fermented butter,
fragrant as blue cheese and laced
with fragments of dried beef. “It’s
amazing,” Lenderking promised.
Back at the hotel it was time
to cook. With Fouzia and Keri
we cooked ouarka (pronounced
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} For details, see
wise from top:
emaa el-Fna; in
uk; the Red City
e with music;
s a huge choice
es; Xanthe Clay
a photocall with
Lenderking;
e takes up the
rChef’ challenge
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For more press information please email press.office@mastercheftravel.co.uk
TRAVEL
ONLINE
Video from
Marrakesh
warka), a tissue-paper-thin pastry
that is a key ingredient in dishes
such as bstilla, a delectable spiced
pigeon or chicken pie. Then Saida,
Fouzia’s colleague, showed us
how to roll couscous, rubbing the
palms of our hands over a huge
dish of semolina and flour until the
characteristic fine clumps form.
Taking it in turns to help,
we watched her make a sevenvegetable couscous dish,
steaming the couscous three
times to make it super light.