Cheap Eats in Fes — Best Budget Food in the Medina

The cheapest good meal in Fes is a bowl of bissara with fresh bread — thick fava-bean soup finished with olive oil, cumin and paprika, eaten at a hole-in-the-wall for around 10 MAD. Harira, the tomato-lentil-chickpea soup, is similarly cheap and filling. These are the everyday fuels of the medina, freshest in the morning and at midday, and they are as satisfying as any sit-down meal.

For a bigger plate, follow the students and shopkeepers to the small canteens and food stalls along Talaa Kebira, Talaa Seghira and around the R'cif and Boujloud gates. A plate of the day — tagine, lentils, kefta with egg, or beans — with bread and salad usually costs 25-45 MAD. Sandwich carts stuff half-baguettes with grilled kefta, merguez, maakouda, chips and salad for 20-35 MAD, a full meal on its own.

Snacks stretch the budget even further. Sfenj doughnuts, msemmen and harcha from griddle carts, bags of olives and dates from the souk, roasted chickpeas, and a slab of sellou for energy all cost just a few dirhams. Fresh bread from the communal bakeries (where locals bring their own dough to bake) is excellent and cheap, and a wedge of it with olives and cheese is a meal in itself.

To eat cheaply and well, do as the Fassis do: soup and bread in the morning, a canteen plate or sandwich at midday, and snacks from the souk in between. Look for Arabic-only menus and local crowds, pay in small notes, and you will eat generously for very little.