What Moroccan salads and starters are there?

The best part of many Moroccan meals arrives first: a constellation of small salads, called mezze-style or simply "salades marocaines," set out in little dishes to scoop with bread. The undisputed favourite is zaalouk, a smoky, garlicky cooked-aubergine and tomato dip slackened with olive oil, paprika and cumin — soft, jammy and deeply savoury. I could make a meal of it alone, swiping it up with warm khobz.

Right beside it you will find taktouka, a cooked salad of grilled green peppers and tomatoes simmered into a sweet-and-smoky tangle, and a humble but addictive cooked-carrot salad tossed with cumin, garlic and a hint of harissa. Beetroot salad brings earthy colour, and a simple chopped salad of finely diced tomato, onion, cucumber and herbs gives fresh crunch against the cooked dishes. Lentils and herbed chickpeas often round out the spread.

Then there is the salad that surprises first-timers: sliced orange dusted with cinnamon, sometimes with a little orange-blossom water and chopped dates or olives — refreshing, fragrant and a clever palate-cleanser. In the north and at celebrations you may also meet shredded fennel or a citrus-and-radish salad. These cold and cooked starters reveal Morocco’s love of layering sweet, smoky and herby in one sitting.

My tip: a table of seven salads is a sign of a serious kitchen, so order generously and treat it as the meal’s opening act, not an afterthought. Tear bread, never spoon. On our food experiences I have guests assemble a salad spread in a riad kitchen — grilling the peppers for taktouka, smoking the aubergine for zaalouk — because once you have made them, you taste the difference everywhere.