This year marks a decade since the Royal Mansour debuted in Marrakech, a palatial luxury hotel owned by the King of Morocco and designed to resemble the city’s medina. To construct this opulent retreat of rouge riads and lush gardens, 1,500 of the country’s top artisans were commissioned to create the metalwork, mosaics and hand-carved doors. It was a project that took almost four years of work and made the hotel “a defining symbol of Moroccan craftsmanship.” Fast forward, and the Royal Mansour Marrakech is celebrating its 10th anniversary in a big way; the hotel recently unveiled a restaurant by star chef Massimiliano Alajmo, and a new fashion partnership and spa program are in the works.
Here’s the scoop on the Italian restaurant called SESAMO. It’s the first partnership with a hotel for the Alajmo Group, whose family-owned restaurants comprise three restaurants in Venice and four in Padua. (The group’s flagship restaurant in Padua, called Le Calandre, has been named to the “World’s 50 Best Restaurants” for a decade, and the group boasts a total of five Michelin stars.) SESAMO’s menu features a combination of chef Massimiliano’s classic dishes (like hand-chopped Piemontese beef “Battua” with white truffle), alongside unique plates invented specifically for the restaurant—all prepared with local ingredients like vegetables from the Royal Mansour gardens. Cap off your meal with the signature dessert “Open Sesame, Apriti Sesamo,” a nougat sphere filled with saffron, neroli and almond foam.
The Royal Mansour is also home to La Grande Table Marocaine, a gastronomic restaurant by Yannick Alléno, one of the best chefs working in France today.
