Taste of Morocco brings exotic East to Silver Spring

Wednesday, May 3, 2006

by M.J. Pleasure

Dining Review

Click here to enlarge this photo

Charlie Shoemaker⁄The Gazette

Taste of Morocco’s bountiful table includes (clockwise from lower left) bastilla, chicken tagine with olives and preserved lemon, Moroccan mint tea, salad royale, couscous with seven vegetables and marinated Moroccan olives.

It has been a joy to watch Downtown Silver Spring develop. Particularly welcome is the influx of ethnic restaurants that followed the first wave of corporate franchises. Lebanese, Latin, Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese and Thai places all moved into spaces on Ellsworth Street, several offshoots of other local eateries.

City Place Mall itself seemed still waiting for the magic touch when three partners opened Taste of Morocco last year. Larger than its 10-year-old Arlington sibling, the restaurant is located in a corner of the mall’s third level, entered from Colesville Road.

Through the elaborate doorway lie a bar and waiting area. With a gracious greeting, we are shown to seats in an L-shaped dining room filled with Moroccan artifacts. Pillowed banquettes line the walls. Behind them, a tall mosaic border in blues, umber, black and gray mimics tile, while the wall above resembles terracotta-colored stone.

Taste of Morocco offers a choice of three set menus for two, ranging from $49.95 to $56.95. Each features a choice of two tomato-based soups with Moroccan spices (harrira, the national soup, and lentil soup), royal salad (a taste of five appetizer salads), bastilla (a stuffed phyllo pastry), tagines or couscous, Moroccan mint tea, pastries and fresh fruit. The lowest-priced selection is completely vegetarian.

These represent good value, but seem like more food than we can handle. Instead, we order rice salad and chicken bastilla a la carte to begin. While waiting, we nibble warm Moroccan bread and black olives marinated in harissa, a red chile sauce. The rice salad turns out to be a revelation containing tuna, cheese and corn.

Four of us share an order of chicken bastilla meant to serve two. The portion size (one-quarter of a 7- or 8-inch pie) is plenty for this rich warm chicken, almond, egg and cinnamon confection wrapped in phyllo and topped with powdered sugar. From experience, we know it is sweet and we scrape off the sugar. The resulting bites are delicious. Like the bread, it is made in-house.

Main dishes are split between tagines, stews made with chicken, lamb, fish or vegetables, and couscous, the semolina-based national dish of Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria. Moroccan food plays with shades of sweet and sour. The chicken tagines, for example, range from sedate to spicy, sweet (with raisins and almonds) to savory (with preserved lemon and olives). Chicken tagine with dates and lamb tagine with sweet potatoes are pleasant enough. The standout is a dish called sweetness under the sea. This red snapper filet with its harissa-kissed sauce and sweet onion and raisin topping is a memorable sweet-hot experience.

Taste of Morocco
8661 Colesville Road, Silver Spring
301-588-4003
Hours: Sunday 1-9:30 p.m.; Monday-Thursday 11 a.m.-3 p.m. (lunch) and 3-10 p.m. (dinner); Friday-Saturday, first sitting between 6 and 6:30 p.m. and second 8 p.m. and later
Entrée prices: $12.95-16.95
Credit cards: All major cards
Accessible www.tasteofmorocco.net

Couscous with lamb shanks is piled high with vegetables, the traditional sept legumes or seven vegetables. These are large chunks of squash (green, acorn and summer), potatoes, carrots, chickpeas and green peas. The shank meat is falling off the bone, and the couscous has absorbed the flavorsome broth. Only afterwards I realize what is missing: Harissa!

About 7:30 p.m., Samira, a vision in a glimmering green gauzy gown appears accompanied by the lively beat of Moroccan music. No chance for conversation now as the belly dancer (one of several appearing on different nights) undulates her way through the room. By then, we are sipping Moroccan mint tea and sharing tiny honey and nut pastries.

Two women at a neighboring table, new to Moroccan cuisine, sample one of the set menus. They navigate the two soups using long-handled spoons. They split on their preferences. They gingerly taste the salads (eggplant with tomato sauce, creamy hummos, sliced carrots vinaigrette, cucumber and rice). They find the bastilla too sweet. (We warned them.) Leaving, we wish them a hearty appetite as they take the first bites of their entrées.

City Place Mall is a work in progress, but Taste of Morocco is a happy fait accompli. And parking in Downtown Silver Spring is a pleasure.