What is a Moroccan tea ceremony, in detail?

The Moroccan tea ceremony looks simple and is anything but — it's a genuine ritual, and watching it performed properly is one of the most quietly mesmerising things you'll see in Morocco. The tea itself, called atay, is built from Chinese green gunpowder tea, a generous bundle of fresh spearmint, and an amount of sugar that always makes first-timers' eyebrows rise. In winter the host might add wormwood (sheeba), verbena or other herbs, but mint and green tea are the heart of it.

The making is precise. The tea leaves are rinsed first to soften their bitterness, then steeped, then the mint and sugar are added and the whole pot is brought back to heat. The host tastes and adjusts, pouring a glass and tipping it back into the pot several times to mix it. And then comes the moment everyone waits for: the pour from on high, the silver teapot lifted a foot or more above the little glass so the tea streams down in a long ribbon, aerating as it falls and crowning each glass with a delicate layer of foam, the 'kuruna' or crown. A good crown is a point of pride.

There's a beautiful saying attached to the three glasses that are traditionally served: 'The first is as gentle as life, the second as strong as love, the third as bitter as death' — because as the same leaves steep on, each round tastes a little different. To refuse tea outright can seem cool, so even a few sips honours the gesture; this is, above all, an act of welcome.

You'll be offered it constantly — in homes, in carpet shops, in riads, in the desert under the stars — and I encourage guests to slow down and accept. The real privilege is being shown how to pour. I love arranging a proper tea session with an Amazigh family or in a riad, where you can learn the rinse, the steep, the high pour and the etiquette, glass in hand, until you can build your own little frothy crown.