COPPERWhat is the national dish of Mauritania?
Mauritania has no official national dish, but thieboudienne (cheb-u-jin) is the one most often cited: fish stuffed with a parsley, garlic and chilli paste, cooked in a tomato broth, with broken rice then cooked in that same broth. It is a coastal dish shared from one large platter; inland, méchoui and couscous are the traditional Moorish meals.
What is thieboudienne?
Thieboudienne is fish and rice cooked in one pot. The name comes from the Wolof ceeb, rice, and jën, fish; in Pulaar it is maaro e liddi, "rice and fish". The Wolof name passed into Hassaniya Arabic, the language of the Moors, which also calls the dish māru w-əl-ḥūt.
English-language references on Mauritanian cuisine describe it as the national dish, and Peace Corps volunteers who lived in the country reported that many people eat it every single day, as a lunch dish especially popular in coastal towns. It comes in two versions, white and red, the red one coloured with tomato. No law makes it official.
How thieboudienne is made
Our thieboudienne recipe starts with the rof: parsley, garlic, Scotch bonnet and salt blended into a thick green paste and pushed into deep slits in white fish steaks. Without it, you only have fish next to rice.
The fish is fried in peanut oil and lifted out. Tomato paste is fried in the same oil until it darkens, then water, dried fish, carrots and cabbage go in for 20 minutes, with the fish back for the last 10. Fish and vegetables come out, and 500 g of broken rice cooks in the red broth for 25 minutes. It must drink the broth, never plain water.
For the last five minutes the pot stays uncovered to form the xoon, the toasted crust at the bottom, which is scraped up and shared.
A coastal dish in a country of herders
Thieboudienne was a late arrival in much of Mauritania. The Moors were nomadic herders, and camel, cattle and their milk sit at the centre of their food. Fish, plentiful off the coast but long disliked by the nomads, entered Mauritanian cooking slowly, through government campaigns and the spread of Senegalese cuisine around Nouakchott and the coast.
The dish itself is attributed to Saint-Louis, in Senegal, in the 19th century, and it is Senegal's national dish too; see the national dish of Senegal. Mauritania's cooking overlaps with Senegal's in the south and with Morocco's in the north.
How a Mauritanian meal is shared
Meals are traditionally eaten together, by hand, from one communal dish:
- Water and soap are passed around so that everyone washes their hands first.
- The meal opens with "Bismillah!".
- The host tosses the best pieces toward the guests' side of the platter.
- Mint tea follows, poured from a height to build foam and drunk in three glasses, the first bitter and the last sweet.
- Zrig, camel's milk thinned with water and sweetened, was the national drink before tea took over.
Other dishes to know from Mauritania
The traditional Moorish dishes are built on meat. Méchoui is a whole lamb roasted for hours beside embers and pulled apart by hand; our home version roasts a 3 kg leg for four hours with spiced butter. Couscous is steamed three times over a lamb and vegetable stew, then shared from one dish, and is also made with camel meat in the desert.
Other names you will meet: maafe, goat or camel meat in a peanut and okra sauce; yassa poulet, from the Wolof and Pulaar communities; hakko, a sauce of bean leaves over couscous; and tichtar, strips of sun-dried meat. For the North African side of these dishes, see the national dish of Morocco.
All three dishes are on our page about the food of Mauritania, and its neighbours in our guide to West African food.
The recipes
- Thieboudienne🇲🇷 Mauritania · 1 hour and 45 minutes
Mechouia🇲🇷 Mauritania · 5 hours and 45 minutes
Couscous🇲🇷 Mauritania · 2 hours
Questions people ask
Is thieboudienne from Senegal or Mauritania?
It is attributed to Saint-Louis in Senegal, where it is the national dish, and it is eaten across West Africa. In Mauritania it is the dish most often called the national dish, especially along the coast.
How do you pronounce thieboudienne?
Roughly "cheb-u-jin". In Wolof it is written ceebu jën.
What is the xoon?
The toasted rice crust that forms at the bottom of the thieboudienne pot. It is scraped up and scattered over the platter to be shared.
What do Mauritanians drink after a meal?
Green tea with mint and sugar, served in three glasses that go from bitter to sweet. Zrig, sweetened camel's milk thinned with water, is the older Moorish drink.
What is méchoui?
A whole lamb roasted slowly beside embers and eaten by hand. With couscous, it is one of the traditional meat dishes of the Moors.
Keep reading
- Traditional food of Mauritania: 13 dishes to know
- What is the national dish of Benin?
- What is the national dish of Burkina Faso?
- What is the national dish of Cabo Verde?
- What is the national dish of Côte d'Ivoire?
- What is the national dish of The Gambia?