What sweets are served at Moroccan weddings and celebrations?

A Moroccan celebration is judged, in part, by its sweets, and walking into a wedding or a feast you'll see them arranged on tiered silver platters like jewellery — golden, glistening, dusted with sesame or sugar, and far too beautiful to be only food. These pastries are mostly almond-and-honey based, time-consuming to make by hand, and a family will bake (or commission) trays and trays of them, because abundance is the whole point: a guest should never see the bottom of the plate.

Certain stars appear again and again. Chebakia are flower-shaped strips of dough fried crisp and bathed in honey then rolled in sesame — sticky, fragrant with orange-blossom and anise, and especially beloved at Ramadan and weddings. Kaab el ghazal, the elegant 'gazelle horns', are slim crescents of thin pastry packed with orange-flower-scented almond paste. Then there are crunchy fekkas (Morocco's answer to biscotti, studded with almonds and sesame), melt-in-the-mouth ghriba shortbread biscuits, and little briouat triangles of almond or peanut paste fried and dunked in honey.

Beyond the pastry trays you'll find other festive sweets. Sellou (also called sfouf) is a dense, toasted-flour, almond and sesame 'energy' paste pressed into mounds — rich, nutty and traditionally made to celebrate a birth or to sustain people through Ramadan. Dates stuffed with coloured almond paste glow on the platters, and at a grand wedding the kitchen may even send out the sweet version of bastilla: crisp warqa pastry layered with milky cream and toasted almonds, dusted with cinnamon and sugar, eaten with a spoon.

My advice is to pace yourself and go around the platter slowly, because every household's recipes are a little different and tasting the range is part of honouring the hosts. And always, always with mint tea — the sweet pastries and the sweet, minty tea are designed for each other. If you're invited to a celebration, accepting these sweets warmly is a small, lovely way to show you understand what the generosity means.