I was supposed to visit Morocco in March, spending a few days in Marrakech before returning to Spain and then back to the US. Sadly, Covid decided to force the early end to that trip, and the cancellation of the Morocco portion entirely. A also has never been, so with this date night we both got to experience a brand new place.

I should also mention here that I recently got an Oculus Quest, so while I won’t be linking to them, we are also adding a VR component to each of our date nights moving forward. Immersion is good!

Anyway, here is our itinerary for our Moroccan date night. I hope it inspires you to plan your own!

Moroccan-Themed Date Night

Eat: Chicken Bastilla and Meskouta

Bastilla, also spelled pastilla, is a Moroccan version of a chicken pot pie. It consists of tender spiced chicken wrapped in phyllo dough, sometimes with other additions, topped with powdered sugar. My chicken was cooked in chicken stock with turmeric, cumin, garlic, ginger, cinnamon, coriander, and allspice, then cooled and shredded. I added re-hydrated golden raisins, and topped it with ricotta seasoned with cumin and smoked paprika, sautéed spinach, and soft scrambled eggs. It then gets baked until the phyllo is golden, topped with powdered sugar, and eaten. It’s a pain – anything with phyllo is, so I’m glad I had A to help – but perhaps my favorite of the date night main courses so far.

First the bastilla from the top, whole, and second, a shot where you can see the layers.

Meskouta is a Moroccan cake, traditionally flavored with orange. It looks a bit dense, but eats fairly light, especially since A added an orange glaze, which isn’t typical. Serve it as is, or with a scoop of ice cream!

A’s meskouta with orange glaze

Learn: History of Moroccan Jews

This was a hard dinner documentary to find, as YouTube was bereft of fun animated history videos on Morocco. We settled for a brief history of Moroccan Jewry, which was nice, although pretty general. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that the country still has a small Jewish population, though, something that is pretty uncommon in Muslim countries post the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948.

Visit: Marrakech

After our short VR visit to the Red City, we wanted to check out a slightly longer travel guide. This one was pretty well done, and definitely sold the city! Now to plan a trip to visit…

Cool architecture is one of the main draws of Marrakech.

Watch: Hideous Kinky

Ok, first off, what a terrible name for a film, even though as a BBC thing it probably means something different than it does here. But really? Ugh.

Ok, that being said, this late 90s film stars Kate Winslet as a mother of two who runs off to 1972 Marrakech to escape all sorts of drama back home. It’s cute, but really hard to follow, as scenes are short and seem to skip around a lot. It’s culturally interesting, the girls are adorable, and Winslet’s character is fairly easy to empathize with. Would I recommend it? Probably not, but neither would I tell people to avoid it.

Terrible name, no?

So that was our Moroccan date night. All in all, I’d call it a success, since it featured my favorite main course, a lovely dessert, and some fun learning/experiencing, even with an average-at-best film. What would you do to virtually visit Morocco?

If you enjoyed this, please check out all of our travel-themed date nights by clicking here.

Like it? Pin it!