Where do you eat in Chefchaouen, the blue city?

Chefchaouen is a different kind of food town from the imperial cities — smaller, mountain-flavoured, more laid-back — and the eating reflects that. This is the Rif, goat-herding country, so the local star is fresh goat's cheese, which you'll find served simply with bread, drizzled with the region's own olive oil and honey, or worked into salads and tagines. It's mild, creamy and a genuine local speciality you won't get in the same way elsewhere. Pair it with the town's hearty mountain cooking — bean stews, lentils, vegetable tagines, slow-cooked meat — and you've got food that's rustic, warming and honest.

Where to eat is easy here because the town is so walkable. The heart of it is Plaza Uta el-Hammam, the main square beneath the kasbah, ringed with café terraces where you can sit for hours over a tagine or a plate of grilled brochettes watching the world drift by. For the views Chefchaouen is famous for, head up: the town is full of rooftop restaurants where you eat among the tumbling blue houses with the green Rif mountains rising behind — book a sunset table and it's pure magic. The lanes climbing toward the Spanish Mosque and the kasbah hide lots of little family-run spots.

I always tell vegetarians that Chefchaouen is one of the friendliest towns in Morocco for them. The relaxed, slightly bohemian atmosphere means many places do excellent meat-free options as a matter of course — vegetable tagines, lentil and bean dishes, big Moroccan salads, the local cheese, omelettes, soups. It's a comfortable place to eat well without meat. For everyone, the goat cheese, the fresh bread baked in neighbourhood ovens, and the mountain honey are the things to seek out. There's also a Spanish-influenced thread to the food here, a legacy of the region's history, so you'll spot the occasional tapas-ish touch.

Honest expectations: Chefchaouen is not a fine-dining destination, and that's the charm — come for the setting and the simplicity rather than gastronomic fireworks. Some of the most touristy square-side terraces trade a little on the view, so for the best food, follow the families into the smaller side-street places, or ask your riad host where they actually eat. Mint tea on a blue rooftop as the light goes golden over the mountains is, honestly, as much the point here as any single dish. It's a town to slow right down and graze gently.