The Peace Corps mission is to spread peace and friendship throughout the world. Under that mission are three goals. The first goal is to help people of interested countries and areas in meeting their needs for trained men and women. The second goal is to promote a better understanding of the American people to the rest of the world. The third of those goals is to educate Americans about other cultures. In order to better facilitate the third goal we will occasionally be posting a cultural tidbit section to the blog which will give you a glimpse into Moroccan culture.

Cultural Tidbit
Bread=Agroum (Tashleheet)= Khobs (Darija)
Bread is right up there with mint tea as staples of the Moroccan diet. Bread is part of every meal except for couscous and is used as an edible eating utensil. Bread is usually made in round loaves but you can also find baguettes. Different families get bread in different ways. We have seen families that start from scratch by growing wheat and making flour, other families buy flour then make bread in wood burning ovens. In our town there are several public bread ovens where you can take your dough to be baked or by already made bread. Some families in larger towns by bread from local bakeries or stores. We are lucky to have fresh warm bread every day and there are few better smells than fresh bread baking. There are other types of bread that are eaten fairly often as well including harsha (cornbread) and minsmin (fried bread) among others. Bread is generally eaten dipped into olive oil or as a spoon for tagines but can have other condiments as well including honey, amlu (like peanut butter) and several types of butter and jam.

Another interesting fact: donkeys eat PAPER!