Al Madina - Tangier

It started with my mate blindly walking in without consulting the group and not asking for a menu or prices. It only went down hill from there. Some other unfortunate tourists in the restaurant wished us good luck when they left shortly after our entry. Our server who spoke reasonably good English when we arrived did the usual Moroccan tactic of trying to order for you and kindly suggested 4 Tajines for the table, we settled on 2 for us as a group of 4 to share. All was confirmed and went back to pleasantries. Our first issue was the large bottle of water we ordered came and had clearly already been opened and refilled from the tap, when we brought this to their attention it was changed quickly without argument, something I was not familiar with in most of my dealings with people on the trip so far. The food arrived, it wasn't especially hot and the clay dish tajines are normally served in was cold, a sign it hadn't been cooked in it. The food itself wasn't terrible, but it was by far the worst tajine we had had on the trip. Then the drama. The bill came. We were charged (over charged too, the most expensive tajines on the trip) for 4 Tajines. The argument started when we challenged it with the first excuse being that we ordered 2 tajines at 2 people sharing size. We were then very theatrically shown the different sized clay dishes. We were not shown this before our order when we very clearly asked for 2. This went on for a while, with us being pretty stubborn in our need to have a win over the hustle game. It was when he proclaimed to not speak English that we knew we were going to have our win. I like to believe it was an honest misunderstanding when we ordered, but the game was strong in that place, he knew we knew he was on the hustle. The 1 star I gave was because I left feeling like we had somewhat had a successful lunch.

Great. Quality Moroccan cuisine and the surrounding atmosphere is amazing. The interior is not different. Great service, good people;

We randomly stumbled on this place and decided to give him an attempt. When we waited to order, I checked the previous reviews and we were apalled, but decided to stop it. This can't be the same restaurant, maybe it's among different owners. Food was solid, bread and olives were free, service good, zero proof of overload. In the second night they gave two free vegetable sides as freebie. A French couple who were there in the previous night also returned because they found it pretty good and cheap.

The manager of the Riad I’m staying at suggested this place. The waiter Ishmael was very friendly. I ordered the fish tagine and tea. He brought me some bread and two bowls of dipping stuff and a bowl of olives. I really enjoyed the meal and the tea. I was charged the price stated on the menu 80 dirhams for the tagine and 10 dirhams for the tea. I was worried since I read the previous reviews after I ordered and after the waiter brought me bowl of soup to try even though I didn’t order the soup. I was never charged for the soup and it was delicious. Great service, great food, I would recommend to friends.

Delicious food, reasonably priced. Staff friendly if a little bit OTT but that’s expected. Excellent tagines and the chicken pie was interestingly superb too. Recommend if you did yourself hungry in the heart of the Medina.