Inside Fez with Palais Amani – Cook and dine in a local’s home and discover 
Moroccan Cuisine in the souks with a chef

Make 2025 the year of a cultural foodie break exploring Morocco’s second largest city. Stay in an Art Deco palace located in the heart of Fez’s UNESCO medina.

Immersive travel experiences allow tourists to discover another side of a destination. Palais Amani has been at the heart of all things Fez for many years, adding new bedrooms including a star gazing rooftop bedroom, launching the city’s first cookery school and now inviting guests to cook and dine at home with a local, in their home.

Morocco is by far North Africa’s gastronomic star and the city of Fez combines flavours from across Morocco inside Africa’s largest car free medina. Palais Amani celebrates the very best of Fez and all things foodie. 

From small restaurants to food stalls to cafés, visitors can feast their way around the vast medina crossing souks filled with the aromas of many spices and of course the famous mint tea. But to really unearth what makes Morocco so delicious, visitors should embark on three totally unique foodie experience with Palais Amani:

(1)  Dine and cook with a local family – Dada welcomes visitors to her home including a visit and baking at the communal bakery
(2)  Learn to cook at the Fez Cooking School including a foodie tour of the souk with a chef followed by lunch
(3) The Moroccan tea ceremony in Palais Amani’s secluded garden to the sound of birdsong   

Cook at Dada’s home with Palais Amani Cooking with Dada offers a wonderful immersion into Moroccan culture and family life. Guests will interact and create a truly unique foodie experience as they spend time hosted by a Moroccan family, preparing food, making traditional bread and baking it at the historic communal bakery. The workshop starts at Dada’s home with a presentation on the ingredients of the day and how the day will unfold. Later guests will enjoy a meal shared as a family. The experience includes bread making and baking in the medina, enjoying traditional Moroccan seasonal salads and a Moroccan tagine of the guest’s choice, also seasonal. The experience ends with preparing traditional mint tea. This is ideal for groups of 2-5 people and priced €802 in total and includes the full day experience and all food. 

Fez Cooking School at Palais Amani For a truly authentic break and to understand a country’s culture you “need to eat it” says Palais Amani’s head chef Houssam Laasiri. He has not only been creating many diverse Moroccan dishes for Palais Amani’s restaurant but also running the Fez Cooking School which is open to all. The Fez Cooking School offers visitors to Fez a unique insight into this magical city combining a guided foodie tour of the medina followed by a cookery class, all in a new purpose-built cookery school on Palais Amani’s roof terrace. Private and group workshops are available. The four hour experience includes a tour of the souks tasting food along a two-hour tour, a two hour cooking class with the newly gathered ingredients and then lunch. Priced €165 per person.

The Moroccan tea ceremony at Palais Amani Within the peaceful 600m2 garden at the centre of Palais Amani guests are invited to experience the quintessential essence of Moroccan culture – traditional Moroccan tea making. Palais Amani’s tea master Ba Mohammed will show guests the method and talk through the history behind tea making in this country. From boiling the water to selecting the freshest mint and sugarloafs. Guests will also learn about the tea sets used to serve the tea and enjoy some special baked goods too. The ceremony lasts 30 minutes is available daily and priced €10 per person.

Palais Amani offers 21 individually designed bedrooms and suites and is home to Eden restaurant with alfresco dining, a rooftop bar, library and underground hammam. A large garden of 600m2 is at the centre of the palace filled with citrus trees where birds, permanent residents here, provide daily birdsong in this tranquil haven.

In 2006 Jemima Mann-Baha and husband Abdelali Mann-Baha bought the former home of one of Fez’s most prominent families (now Palais Amani), which had laid abandoned and deteriorating in the heart of the medina for over a quarter of a century. Four years of extensive renovation restored the property to its old splendour and revealed many stories about family, heritage and legacy. The renovation included the maintenance of art déco features dating back to the 1930s.

Fez reached its height in the 13th century when it replaced Marrakech as the capital of Morocco. The principal monuments in the medina including palaces, riads, mosques, libraries and fountains date from this period. Today whilst Fez is no longer the capital it has retained its status as the country’s cultural and spiritual centre recognised by UNESCO. 

Fez is like nowhere else in Morocco and Palais Amani is helping to preserve the city’s heritage while also shaping its future. Make 2025 a year to discover this unique city filled with culture.   

www.palaisamani.com 12 Derb el Miter, Oued Zhoune, Fes Medina, 30000, Morocco
B&B is priced from £180.00 per room per night