How to choose and use your tagine?

A tagine is a dish and a cook­ing method. From tra­di­tion­al ter­ra­cot­ta tagines to mod­ern (and very expen­sive) enam­elled cast iron tagines suit­able for induc­tion hobs, how do you choose the tagine that suits you and make your recipes a success?

Tagines of all sizes

There is every­thing from large fam­i­ly tagines, where you can serve six or sev­en por­tions, to small indi­vid­ual tagines used by sin­gles or restau­rants. A diam­e­ter of 22 — 24 cen­time­tres is per­fect for a fam­i­ly. Remember that the height of the lid is pro­por­tion­al to the diameter!

... and of all finishes

You can for­get about alu­mini­um tagines, which are very cheap and whose thick­ness does not allow you to sim­mer for a long time with­out the risk of sticking.

We also for­get, at least for the kitchen, the tagines dec­o­rat­ed with pret­ty colours. They are dec­o­ra­tive pieces, they will not stand up to use and wash­ing. I even avoid putting food on them that is too hot, as I am not sure of the "food" qual­i­ty of the glaze. (This is an understatement…)

Outside Morocco, there are tagines suit­able for induc­tion hobs, cast iron, etc.

Seasoning your tagine and using it on something other than a brazier

High heat caus­es the tagine to crack. To avoid this, you must :

• take care to wet it well before the first use, the dish must be well moistened;
• the tagine may split, but the dif­fer­ent pieces will not spread and will remain tight­ly sealed;
• use an iron plate, a dish turned upside down to keep it away from direct con­tact with the gas, and find the gen­tle heat of the brazier.

Like all earth­en­ware dish­es, a tagine can­not be washed aggres­sive­ly. The lay­er of var­nish pro­tects it and makes it easy to wash. It is only on the out­side that fat and food can burn and be dif­fi­cult to clean!

From casserole to tagine to plate and back again

Nowadays, in many Moroccan fam­i­lies, the ingre­di­ents of the tagine are cooked in a pres­sure cook­er and then served in the tra­di­tion­al dish, where each per­son will serve his or her own bite, with his or her "lit­tle piece of bread".

The tagine can also be placed on the table and served on plates!

Or put in a tagine any­thing oth­er than a "tagine", such as .… a pizza!

Tagine is the art of stacking

When food is cooked in a tagine and not in a casse­role, there is an art to lay­er­ing the dif­fer­ent ingre­di­ents in a beau­ti­ful pyra­mid. The meat should be at the bot­tom, just above the lay­er of onions (but you can brown it first, before set­ting it aside, and melt­ing the onions).

The spices are also put in, and then the cone is assem­bled, with the pota­toes and car­rots under­neath, and the cour­gettes, toma­toes and oth­er quick­er cook­ing veg­eta­bles on top, added dur­ing cooking.

There are also "flat­ter" tagines, such as the famous meat­balls or sar­dines, with lots of toma­toes, or tagines made with figs, sul­tanas, etc., which will have very few vegetables.

Why am I telling you all this?

Because I imag­ine that a cook­ing block writ­ten in Morocco that doesn't men­tion tagines would seem strange to you. But to be hon­est, I've always let my hus­band make the tagines, while I'm busy with my casse­role or brais­ing pan…