Recipe
🍽️ DINNER
Chicken Bastilla
A sweet-savory pie of spiced shredded chicken and almonds in crackling pastry, dusted with sugar and cinnamon.
Moroccan · advanced · serves 6
prep 45 min · cook 60 min
~804 cal · 55g protein · 27g carbs · 54g fat · 8g fiber · 14g sugars · 13g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
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Bastilla (or pastilla) is the showstopper of Moroccan celebration cooking, a large round pie of paper-thin warqa pastry enclosing spiced, shredded poultry (traditionally pigeon, now usually chicken) layered with a fragrant almond-and-egg filling, then baked and dusted on top with powdered sugar and cinnamon. Its sweet-savory contrast is deliberate and dazzling.
The dish descends from the Andalusian and royal kitchens that shaped Morocco's refined cuisine, and it remains labor-intensive, festive food reserved for weddings, feasts, and honored guests. Building the delicate layers of crackling pastry is a genuine culinary craft.
Served in Casablanca and across Morocco as a spectacular opening course, bastilla is meant to astonish, the shatter of the sugar-dusted crust giving way to savory spiced meat beneath.
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Make it yours
✓ Naturally pork-free. No swaps needed.
Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
🐖 Pork-Free
Dietary labels are a cooking guide, not allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish; we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, read the label on every product you use, and note that a kitchen can cross-contaminate in ways a recipe cannot control.
Ingredients
US
Metric
Serves 6
2 lbs chicken thighs
10 warqa or filo pastry sheets
1.5 cups almonds, toasted and ground
4 eggs (to bind the filling)
6 tbsp butter, melted (for brushing)
2 onions, grated
a pinch
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp black pepper
2 tbsp
1/2 cup cilantro
1/2 cup parsley
1/4 cup powdered sugar
1 tbsp ground cinnamon (to finish)
Instructions
1
Braise the chicken (or mushrooms and chickpeas) with the onions, saffron, ginger, cinnamon, black pepper, and a splash of water until tender, about 30 minutes.
2
Lift out and shred the chicken, then reduce the remaining sauce until nearly dry.
3
Take the pan off the heat and beat the eggs (or slurry) into the hot reduced sauce until softly scrambled and creamy.
4
Fold the egg mixture into the shredded chicken along with the herbs.
5
Fry or toast the almonds until deep gold, then chop them coarsely with a spoon of sugar, the cinnamon, and the orange blossom water.
✎ Chef’s note
Chop the almonds coarsely rather than grinding them to powder, and perfume them with orange blossom water. That sweet, crunchy, scented layer against the savoury chicken is what makes a bastilla.
6
Butter a round pan and layer in 6 pastry sheets, letting them overhang the edge.
✎ Chef’s note
Keep the unused warqa or filo under a damp cloth as you work. It dries and cracks within minutes of being exposed to air.
7
Spread the chicken filling over the pastry, then scatter the sweet almond mixture on top.
8
Fold the overhanging pastry over the filling, then top with 4 more buttered sheets, tucking the edges under to seal.
9
Bake at 375F (190C) for 30 minutes, until deep gold and crackling.
10
Invert onto a plate and finish with a snow of powdered sugar and a cinnamon crosshatch. Serve warm.
Casablanca-Settat celebration tradition.
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🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
📍
Casablanca-Settat. Casablanca-Settat is Morocco's Atlantic heartland, two farming plains, the Doukkala and the Chaouia, running down to a working coast. Oualidia's sheltered lagoon makes it the country's oyster capital, El Jadida and Mohammedia grill the day's catch at the port, and Settat presses some of Morocco's best olive oil. Couscous on Fridays, chermoula-marinated fish, and preserved lemon run through its cooking, and Casablanca eats all of it at once.
🗺️
Morocco. Couscous is not Morocco's alone: UNESCO inscribed the knowledge and practices around it in 2020 as a shared Algerian, Mauritanian, Moroccan and Tunisian tradition. In Moroccan homes it is the Friday dish, hand-rolled from semolina and steamed three times over the broth it will be served with, carried out on one communal platter after midday prayers.
🌍
Africa. The structure repeats across most of the continent: one starch and one sauce. A grain or root is cooked stiff, torn or rolled by hand, and used to carry a stew of leaves, groundnut, okra or fish, usually from a shared bowl and with the right hand. UNESCO listings have followed that logic, inscribing couscous in 2020 as a shared Maghreb tradition and Ivorian attieke in 2024.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from Morocco
Chicken Tagine with Preserved Lemon & OlivesSlow-braised chicken perfumed with saffron and ginger, brightened by salty preserved lemon and green olives.
Kefta Mkaouara (Meatball Tagine)Spiced meatballs simmered in a cumin-scented tomato sauce with eggs cracked on top, a bubbling tagine eaten with bread.
BaghrirSpongy "thousand-hole" semolina pancakes drenched in a warm honey-and-butter syrup.
Browse all Morocco recipes →
Good to know
You’ll need: Oven, Whisk.
Storing it: Store in an airtight container. Most keep 2 to 3 days at room temperature, and longer refrigerated.
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Frequently asked questions
What is Chicken Bastilla?
A sweet-savory pie of spiced shredded chicken and almonds in crackling pastry, dusted with sugar and cinnamon.
Where does Chicken Bastilla come from?
Chicken Bastilla is a Moroccan dish from Casablanca-Settat, Morocco.
Can Chicken Bastilla be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Chicken Bastilla recipe includes substitution suggestions for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free, and pork-free versions, including several at once such as gluten-free and dairy-free together. Treat them as a starting guide rather than a guarantee, and see the allergen note below.
Is Chicken Bastilla safe for people with food allergies?
Our dietary labels and substitutions are a cooking guide, not medical or allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish, but we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, always read the label on every product you use, and remember a home or commercial kitchen can cross-contaminate ingredients in ways a recipe cannot control.
How long does Chicken Bastilla take to make?
About 105 minutes total (45 minutes prep, 60 minutes cooking), serving 6.
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