Ras el Hanout

the head of the shop: the Moroccan spice merchant's compound blend, toasted and ground from a dozen or more spices around a core of dried rosebuds, ginger, cubeb, and long pepper

Origin: Morocco

From the journey of Rose.

Ras el hanout means the head of the shop, and it is not a fixed recipe but a claim: the best of what the merchant has, blended to his own formula and sold as his signature. No two shops in a Moroccan souk make it the same way, the count of ingredients runs from about a dozen to forty, and the more elaborate historical versions ran to genuinely exotic and sometimes alarming inclusions, amongst them ash berries, monk's pepper, belladonna, and the notorious Spanish fly, which the Moroccan authorities have long since prohibited. What survives across every version is a recognisable core, and dried rosebuds are one of its defining members. They are what give the blend its distinctive floral top note and separate it from every other North African spice mixture; a ras el hanout without rose is simply a spice mixture. The rose in question is grown a few hundred kilometres away in the Dades valley around Kelaat M'Gouna, where the damask has been planted as a hedge along the irrigation channels for centuries. The blend goes into the great festival dishes, the lamb mrouzia with its raisins and honey, the tfaya couscous, and the long-braised tagines, and it is used with restraint, a teaspoon or two rather than a handful, because at full strength it dominates everything it touches.

Ingredients

Floral

3 tbsp dried rosebuds or dried rose petals, food-grade

Whole Spices

2 tbsp coriander seeds
1 tbsp cumin seeds
2 tsp black peppercorns
1 tsp cubeb berries (or an extra tsp black peppercorns)
1 tsp long pepper, broken up (or an extra tsp black peppercorns)
2 tsp green cardamom seeds, husks discarded
1 tsp whole cloves
1 tsp fennel seeds
1 tsp aniseed
2 whole blades of mace
1 whole cinnamon stick, broken

Ground Spices

2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground turmeric
1 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
0.5 tsp ground galangal (optional, traditional)
0.5 tsp cayenne or ground dried chilli
1 pinch saffron threads, crumbled (optional)

Method

Pick over the rosebuds, discarding any stems and green calyces, and set them aside. They are not toasted with the rest.
Toast the whole spices in a dry heavy frying pan over a medium-low heat for 5 to 8 minutes, shaking the pan constantly, until they darken a shade and smell strongly fragrant. Add the cloves, mace, and cinnamon only for the last 2 minutes.
Tip the toasted spices onto a cold plate and spread them out to cool completely, which takes about 10 minutes.
Grind the cooled spices to a fine powder in a spice grinder or a heavy mortar, working in batches. Add the rosebuds towards the end and grind briefly, just enough to break them down.
Sift the ground mixture, returning any coarse fragments to the grinder, then stir in the ground ginger, turmeric, nutmeg, galangal, cayenne, and saffron. Store in a sealed jar in a cool dark cupboard.

Notes

Every Moroccan household and every merchant has a different formula, and this one is a reasonable middle course; treat the proportions as a starting point rather than a rule. Cubeb and long pepper are the two ingredients most worth hunting down, since they give the blend the resinous, faintly camphorous note that distinguishes an interesting ras el hanout from a generic warm-spice mix; both are sold by good spice merchants. Use it sparingly, a teaspoon or two in a dish for four, added early so it cooks into the fat rather than sprinkled on at the end. It is essential to mrouzia, the honeyed lamb tagine of Eid, and to the caramelised onion and raisin tfaya served over couscous; it is also very good rubbed into lamb or chicken before roasting, stirred into the oil for roasted vegetables, or worked into butter for a piece of fish.

The Gastrographer

Name: Ras el Hanout
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 8 min
Total time: 30 min
Yield: 40
Cuisine: Morocco
Ingredients: 3 tbsp dried rosebuds or dried rose petals, food-grade; 2 tbsp coriander seeds; 1 tbsp cumin seeds; 2 tsp black peppercorns; 1 tsp cubeb berries (or an extra tsp black peppercorns); 1 tsp long pepper, broken up (or an extra tsp black peppercorns); 2 tsp green cardamom seeds, husks discarded; 1 tsp whole cloves; 1 tsp fennel seeds; 1 tsp aniseed; 2 whole blades of mace; 1 whole cinnamon stick, broken; 2 tsp ground ginger; 1 tsp ground turmeric; 1 tsp freshly grated nutmeg; 0.5 tsp ground galangal (optional, traditional); 0.5 tsp cayenne or ground dried chilli; 1 pinch saffron threads, crumbled (optional)

Mapping Culinary History

To explore — select an ingredient below.

To explore — select an ingredient below · click any location dot on the map for recipes and stories · browse the information panel on the right · trace the full journey on the timeline.

Journey Point Map Key

Ingredient originTrade or transit route

Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control