The Complete Snacker's Guide to Medina Eating

Known as "thousand-hole pancakes," beghrir are spongy semolina crepes cooked on one side only, producing a surface covered in tiny craters that absorb melted butter and honey like a delicious sponge. The batter is leavened with yeast, giving the pancakes a slightly tangy depth. Served in stacks, drizzled with a mixture of melted butter and warm honey, or sometimes with argan oil amlou, beghrir are a breakfast staple that visitors quickly become addicted to.

A flaky spiral flatbread made by rolling the dough into a rope, coiling it into a disc, then flattening and pan-frying until the layers separate into a crisp, buttery spiral. Meloui has a slightly more robust texture than msemen, with visible concentric layers that peel apart satisfyingly. It is often served for breakfast with soft cheese and olive oil, or torn into pieces and used to scoop up tagine sauce.

A dense, golden semolina griddle cake with a grainy, slightly crunchy exterior and a tender, crumbly interior. Harcha resembles an English muffin in shape and size but has a distinctly Moroccan personality -- the semolina gives it a subtle sweetness and a texture that crumbles beautifully when broken open. Split and filled with soft cheese, butter, and honey for the quintessential Moroccan breakfast sandwich.

Minced lamb or beef mixed with grated onion, fresh parsley, cumin, paprika, and a pinch of cinnamon, pressed onto flat metal skewers and grilled over white-hot charcoal. The exterior chars lightly while the interior stays impossibly juicy and fragrant, the fat rendering into the coals and sending up plumes of spice-scented smoke. Served in a split piece of khobz with chopped tomato, raw onion, and a dusting of cumin.

Slender, deeply spiced lamb and beef sausages grilled over charcoal until the casings blister and the fat renders into the coals, releasing plumes of fragrant smoke. The crimson color comes from harissa and paprika, and each vendor guards a personal blend of cumin, coriander, and fennel seeds. The sausages arrive blistered and slightly blackened, served in bread with harissa, chopped salad, and pickled vegetables.

Thick potato cakes seasoned with cumin, turmeric, garlic, and fresh herbs, coated in a light batter and deep-fried until the outside forms a golden, shatteringly crisp shell around a creamy, spiced potato interior. Maaqouda is pure comfort food -- hot, greasy, satisfying, and cheap. Often served in a sandwich with harissa and olives, it is the kind of street food that vendors have been making from the same recipe for generations.

For the adventurous: slices of calves brain, lightly poached and then pan-fried with cumin, salt, and pepper until golden, served in a crusty bread roll with chermoula sauce. The texture is remarkably creamy and delicate, not unlike a rich custard. Cervelles en sandwich is a Marrakech specialty that most tourists walk past, but the stalls serving it are always surrounded by enthusiastic locals. It is one of the most authentic Moroccan street food experiences available.

In coastal cities, vendors set up shop with ice-packed displays of the morning catch: sardines, anchovies, sole, shrimp, and squid. You choose your selection, it gets dusted in seasoned flour and dropped into a bubbling vat of oil, emerging minutes later golden and crisp. The fish is served on paper with lemon wedges, bread, and a fiery harissa-spiked tomato sauce. At Essaouira port, the fish travels from boat to grill to your plate in under an hour.

Small garden snails simmered in a deeply aromatic broth of thyme, licorice root, anise, gum arabic, and a dozen other herbs and spices. Vendors sell them from large copper cauldrons, spooning the snails into bowls with a ladle of the medicinal-tasting broth. The broth is the real star -- dark, complex, slightly sweet, and deeply herbal. Moroccans consider it a digestive remedy and drink it like a tonic, especially in the cooler months.