ymib.com - Daily Inspiration

Morocco and many other North African regions are heavily influential in my cooking, along with middle-eastern cuisine. Lately I have become quite interested in the art of Tagine cooking. Below are some great finds from Tagines.com. They have some really great and affordable tagines to choose from that are suitable for stove-top cooking(only on low heat) and oven baking at a maximum of 350 degrees. They carry a decent range of tagines that are for cooking and they have some really nice decorative tagines that can be used for serving. I think the beauty of incorporating a different “flavor” in your cooking process can really inspire you to cook up some fantastic meals. Basically the tangine acts as sort of a slow cooker, that fuses the flavors and juices together. Both the serving dish and the actual entree is called a tangine, and one of the most popular tagine dishes is the Chicken Tagine. (When we lived in Savannah, there was a Moroccan restaurant, where they served a tagine dish that was similar to this recipe, only instead of using chicken they used shrimp, and it was fabulous!).

All of the featured tagines above are from Tagines.com (I love the small condiment tagines, that are great for serving spices and sauces), except the solid blue one, which is from Sur La Table. This tagine is a bit more pricey, bu the bottom dish is made of cast iron, which makes this tagine a bit sturdier for cooking often. The most important thing to remember when cooking with your tagine is that you have to season your tagine before using. I can't wait to try out this new cooking inspiration! Have any of you used the tagine within your culinary endeavors?

Cookbooks: Most Moroccan cookbooks will include meat, but I usually just substitute and transform these dishes into vegetarian/seafood versions: Authentic Recipes from Morocco: $10.17, Cooking Kasbah: $15.61, Tagine: Spicy Stews from Morocco: $10.36, Arabesque: $23.10.