Recipe
🍰 DESSERT
Makroudh
Diamond-shaped semolina pastries filled with spiced date paste and soaked in honey, a Tunisian and Maghrebi classic.
Tunisian · medium · serves 12
prep 40 min · cook 25 min
~544 cal · 8g protein · 119g carbs · 7g fat · 7g fiber · 77g sugars · 3g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
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Makroudh is a treasured sweet of Tunisia and the wider Maghreb, especially associated with the holy city of Kairouan, whose date-filled version is famous across the region. Its name refers to its diamond shape, cut on the diagonal.
A dough of coarse bound with olive oil and orange-blossom water is wrapped around a paste of spiced with cinnamon, then pressed with a patterned mould, cut into diamonds, and either fried or baked. Still warm, the pieces are plunged into honey or a light syrup that they drink up. Chewy, fragrant with and blossom, and glistening with honey, they are a fixture of celebrations and the Ramadan table.
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Make it yours
✓ Naturally vegetarian and egg-, nut- and 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 12
4 cups coarse
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup butter, melted and
3 cups pitted
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
3 tbsp
1 tsp grated orange zest
3 tbsp toasted sesame seeds
2 cups honey
Instructions
1
Mix the semolina with the olive oil, the melted clarified butter, a little water and orange blossom into a firm dough, then leave it to rest.
✎ Chef’s note
Semolina, never flour, and coarse rather than fine. Part of what makes makroudh Tunisian is the pairing itself: cereals from the north of the country worked with olive oil from the Sahel.
2
Cook the dates with the cinnamon and orange zest into a smooth, spreadable paste, adding a splash of orange blossom water.
3
Roll the dough into logs, fill with a core of date paste, flatten, mark with a pattern, and cut into diamonds.
✎ Chef’s note
Rest the semolina dough so the grains hydrate and it holds together; freshly mixed, it crumbles when you shape it.
4
Fry or bake until golden, then dip each one in warm honey for only about ten seconds and lift it onto a rack to drain, scattering sesame seeds over while they are still sticky.
✎ Chef’s note
A brief dip, not a soak. Ten seconds in warm honey glazes them; leave them in and they go sodden. Makroudh belongs to Kairouan, the spiritual capital, which held the first national makroud festival in 2008, and it is a wedding and Eid sweet, handed round with mint tea.
Tunisian Kairouan tradition.
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🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
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Tunis. Lablabi is the medina's working breakfast, eaten early and standing: chickpeas in a cumin broth ladled over torn day-old bread and finished at the counter with harissa, olive oil, capers, lemon, crushed garlic and a soft egg broken over the top. Brik's history is murkier than it looks, since the word comes from the Turkish borek and Libyan Jewish cooks claim the technique too.
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Tunisia. Harissa is not a condiment on the side but the base of the pot, and UNESCO inscribed the knowledge, skills and practices around it in 2022. Sun-dried chillies are pounded with garlic, caraway and coriander, and the paste goes into couscous broth, into stews, and straight onto bread with olive oil and tuna.
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Africa. Africa's fifty-four nations hold cuisines as different as Morocco's slow-cooked tagines and South Africa's open-fire braai, yet shared threads run through them: ancient grains like millet, sorghum, and teff; stews thickened with groundnut, okra, or palm; and fiery condiments from Tunisian harissa to Ethiopian berbere. Staple starches, fufu, injera, ugali, couscous, anchor communal meals often eaten by hand from a shared dish, where hospitality is a point of honor.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from Tunisia
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LablabiChickpeas in garlicky cumin broth ladled over torn bread, hit with harissa, lemon, and a soft egg, Tunisia’s working breakfast.
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Good to know
You’ll need: Oven.
Storing it: Store in an airtight container. Most keep 2 to 3 days at room temperature, and longer refrigerated.
Make it a Tunisia meal
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Frequently asked questions
What is Makroudh?
Diamond-shaped semolina pastries filled with spiced date paste and soaked in honey, a Tunisian and Maghrebi classic.
Where does Makroudh come from?
Makroudh is a Tunisian dish from Tunis, Tunisia.
Can Makroudh be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Makroudh 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 Makroudh 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 Makroudh take to make?
About 65 minutes total (40 minutes prep, 25 minutes cooking), serving 12.
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