Tagine (lamb)

Lamb shoulder or shank slow-cooked in a conical clay pot with onion, garlic, ras el hanout (the warm-spice mixture of cumin, coriander, cinnamon, ginger, paprika, and often a dozen other spices), saffron, preserved lemon, olives, and either prunes or apricots depending on the regional style. The signature is the sweet-savoury-spiced complexity: long-cooked lamb depth wrapped in cinnamon and ginger warmth, lifted by saffron's distinct floral-honeyed character, sharpened by preserved lemon's salty-fermented acid, with dried fruit adding rounded sweetness.