La Maison Arabe Marrakech: History, Cooking Class
La Maison Arabe Marrakech, fact-checked: its 1946 origins, the Ruspoli riad, today's Moroccan menu, the cooking class and why it serves no burgers.
Photo: Robert Prazeres, CC BY-SA 4.0
La Maison Arabe Marrakech is a historic riad hotel in the medina, near Bab Doukkala, that began as a restaurant in 1946. Hélène Sébillon-Larochette and her daughter Suzy founded it. Prince Fabrizio Ruspoli restored it between 1994 and 1998, and it joined Cenizaro Hotels & Resorts in 2019. Today it serves Moroccan and international food and runs a well-known cooking school. It does not serve burgers. And no source I found ties chef Meryem Cherkaoui to it.
I started this piece expecting to write about a burger. Our original brief described La Maison Arabe as a burger venue run by chef Meryem Cherkaoui. Both claims fell apart once I checked the operator’s site, its 2019 press release and the travel and food press. What follows is the verified story, dated and sourced, plus pointers for readers who came looking for the best burger in Marrakesh.
La Maison Arabe Marrakech at a glance
La Maison Arabe is a 37-room riad hotel with restaurants, a spa and a cooking school, located at 1 Derb Assehbe, Bab Doukkala, in the Marrakesh medina.
| Detail | Verified fact | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Riad hotel with restaurants, bar and cooking school | Cenizaro (official) |
| Opened | 1946, as a restaurant | Cenizaro, Spanish Sabores |
| Address | 1 Derb Assehbe, Bab Doukkala, Marrakech 40000, Morocco | Travel Weekly Asia, Journal des Palaces |
| Phone | +212 524 387 010 | Travel Weekly Asia, Journal des Palaces |
| Rooms | 37 (current official site) | Cenizaro |
| Operator | Cenizaro Hotels & Resorts, since 2019 | Cenizaro press release |
| Burgers on the menu | None found in any source | Cenizaro, Afar |
La Maison Arabe history: from 1946 restaurant to boutique riad
La Maison Arabe opened in 1946 as a restaurant, and Cenizaro calls it the first restaurant in the Marrakesh medina open to foreigners.
According to the operator, two Frenchwomen founded it: Hélène Sébillon-Larochette and her daughter Suzy. They had the backing of Pasha Thami El Glaoui, then the most powerful man in Marrakesh. Other sources give different names and disagree on which woman was the mother. I use Cenizaro’s version here.
Famous guests at La Maison Arabe
The operator reports that Ernest Hemingway, Jackie Kennedy, Rita Hayworth, Queen Ingrid of Denmark and Winston Churchill dined at La Maison Arabe.
That list comes from Cenizaro’s own history page. I found no independent record of any single visit. Plenty of old Marrakesh addresses claim a similar guest list, and one dated photograph would be worth more than the whole roll call. Read it as the house’s account of its past, not as history.
Closure and the Ruspoli restoration (1994–1998)
The restaurant closed in the 1980s. In 1994, Italian aristocrat Prince Fabrizio Ruspoli took it over and restored it, then reopened it in 1998 as a boutique riad hotel.
Afar, Spanish Sabores and Cenizaro all describe it as one of the first boutique riad hotels in Marrakesh. Ruspoli owned the property for 25 years. In 2016, Le Journal des Palaces reported a 20th-anniversary expansion: a street-level boutique, a 30-cover tea salon and restaurant, and a new cooking-school kitchen for 20 participants. Counting back, that anniversary points to 1996, which matches neither the 1994 takeover nor the 1998 reopening. I report it as the magazine published it.
The 2019 sale and today’s ownership
In October 2019, La Maison Arabe passed from Ruspoli to new owners and became part of the Cenizaro Hotels & Resorts portfolio.
Cenizaro announced the addition on 24 October 2019. Travel Daily reported that Ruspoli sold the property to Goldcove Pte Ltd, a subsidiary of Bonvests Holdings, for about S$29.93 million in a deal that also covered a country club. I found no confirmation of the exact closing date, or of whether Ruspoli kept any role after the sale.
| Year | Milestone | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 1946 | Restaurant opens in the medina, founded by Hélène Sébillon-Larochette and her daughter Suzy | Cenizaro |
| 1980s | Restaurant closes | Spanish Sabores, Afar |
| 1994 | Prince Fabrizio Ruspoli takes over and starts restoring | Spanish Sabores, Afar, Cenizaro |
| 1998 | Reopens as a boutique riad hotel | Spanish Sabores, Afar, Cenizaro |
| 2016 | 20th anniversary; 26 rooms and suites, new tea salon and cooking-school kitchen | Le Journal des Palaces |
| 24 Oct 2019 | Cenizaro announces the property joins its portfolio (32 rooms and suites) | Cenizaro press release |
| 2026 | 37 rooms listed on the official site | Cenizaro |
Why the room count keeps changing
The room count grew over time: 26 rooms and suites in 2016, 32 in 2019 and 37 on the current official site.
Travel pages often quote one of these numbers without a date. That’s where the confusion comes from. Each figure above is tied to its source and year.
La Maison Arabe room count over time: 26 rooms and suites in 2016 (Le Journal des Palaces), 32 when Cenizaro took over in 2019 (Cenizaro press release) and 37 on the official site in 2026. (1600×900) (Chart: Burger Breton, CC BY 4.0, built from Le Journal des Palaces (2016), the Cenizaro press release of 24 Oct 2019 and cenizaro.com (checked 12 Oct 2026); rendered with QuickChart)
La Maison Arabe restaurant: what you can eat
According to the operator’s 2019 press release, La Maison Arabe has served Moroccan cuisine in its main dining room and a French, Moroccan and Asian menu in a second restaurant.
- Le Restaurant serves Moroccan cuisine under a hand-painted zouaké ceiling, with live Arabo-Andalusian music.
- Les Trois Saveurs serves French, Moroccan and Asian dishes.
I could not confirm that both restaurants still run under these names in 2026, and no source I found names the current head chef. That gap matters. A dining room is only as good as whoever runs the kitchen this year, so call the hotel before you book one for its reputation.
Signature dishes reported by travel media
Afar lists pastilla, tagines and slow-cooked meat dishes as the house specialties.
A sliced Moroccan chicken pastilla, flaky warqa pastry dusted with sugar and almonds, on a zellige-tiled table. Pastilla is one of La Maison Arabe’s reported specialties. Illustrative photo from 2017, not taken at La Maison Arabe. (3264×2448) (Photo: Weetjesman, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Moroccan\_Pastilla.jpg)
- Pastilla, with chicken or pigeon
- Beef tagine with quince, or with orange and saffron
- Monkfish and shrimp
- Lamb with figs, dates and apricots
- Chicken with preserved lemon and olives
A Moroccan tagine of slow-cooked meat with quince, prunes, toasted almonds and sesame. La Maison Arabe’s menu runs on dishes like this, with Afar listing beef tagine with quince. Illustrative photo taken in Chefchaouen in 2013, not at La Maison Arabe. (2820×1826) (Photo: Magda Baidan, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tajine\_with\_goat\_meat\_and\_quinces.jpg)
Does La Maison Arabe serve burgers?
No source shows a burger at La Maison Arabe. The official site, the 2019 press release, the travel press and the dish lists all describe Moroccan and international cooking. None mentions a burger.
A pool or room-service burger may exist. I could not verify one, so I won’t claim it. If you want a burger in the medina, skip to the Marrakesh burger section below.
La Maison Arabe cooking class
The cooking school is La Maison Arabe’s best-known food draw: local cooks teach traditional Moroccan techniques in a dedicated kitchen.
The 2019 press release says workshops were led by a dada, a traditional Moroccan cook, who had worked at the hotel for more than 10 years, together with a local university professor. The current official site says local chefs teach traditional techniques. The kitchen opened in 2016 was built for 20 participants.
My take: if you have one afternoon at La Maison Arabe, book the class rather than dinner. It is the part of the house with the longest, best-documented track record, and you leave knowing how to fold a pastilla.
A Moroccan cooking class making pastilla: eggs cooked in spiced onion sauce, shredded chicken spread on warqa sheets, and students in aprons and chef’s hats. It shows the kind of hands-on workshop La Maison Arabe runs. Illustrative photo from 2013, not taken at the La Maison Arabe cooking school. (1024×1024) (Photo: kochtopf, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pr%C3%A9paration\_de\_la\_pastilla.jpg)
How much does the cooking class cost?
The last published prices I found date from 2016 and were quoted in euros, not dirhams: €28 per person for a group class and €455 for a private half-day class for 1 to 6 people.
Those figures are ten years old and almost certainly out of date. Ask the hotel for the current price in Moroccan dirhams (MAD) before you book.
Is Meryem Cherkaoui the chef at La Maison Arabe?
No. Meryem Cherkaoui is a respected Moroccan chef, but no source links her to La Maison Arabe.
Here is what her record actually shows:
- Born in Rabat, trained at Institut Paul Bocuse, then worked at the Hôtel Majestic in Cannes and the Hôtel de Crillon in Paris.
- Returned to Morocco in 2002 and opened La Maison du Gourmet in Casablanca.
- Founded a culinary school in Casablanca in 2009.
- Her Marrakesh link was Mes’Lalla, the fine-dining restaurant at the Mandarin Oriental Marrakech, which she ran from about 2015–2016. The restaurant, by then called “Mes’lalla Meryem Cherkaoui”, closed on 31 July 2017.
- In May 2023 she announced the Maison de la Méditerranée at 50 La Canebière in Marseille, a women-led food court and training venue in the former Piery jewelry shop, with an opening planned for late 2023.
I could not confirm whether the Marseille project opened or whether La Maison du Gourmet is still open, so I don’t describe either as current. Sources: Bladi.net, Made in Marseille, Medias24, TelQuel and Mandarin Oriental.
Where is La Maison Arabe in Marrakesh?
La Maison Arabe is at 1 Derb Assehbe, Bab Doukkala, inside the medina near the Bab Doukkala mosque, a short walk from Jemaa el-Fnaa.
According to Cenizaro, the property now has two swimming pools, a hammam and spa, a piano-jazz bar and a Country Club in the Palmeraie. To book a table, a room or a class, call +212 524 387 010.
Map of the Marrakesh medina from Bab Doukkala (northwest) to Jemaa el-Fnaa square (southeast). La Maison Arabe is at 1 Derb Assehbe, near the Bab Doukkala Mosque, a short walk from the square. Phone: +212 524 387 010. (iframe 800×450) (Map: © OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL 1.0, https://www.openstreetmap.org/copyright)
Best burger in Marrakesh: where to look instead
La Maison Arabe is the wrong address for a burger in Marrakesh. Nothing on its menu, past or present, points that way.
The names that do come up for that search are Medina Burger and Fluffy on TripAdvisor lists, plus the Fatburger and Buffalo’s Express that opened on M Avenue in 2022, according to news reports. I have not yet checked their addresses, menus or current prices, so treat them as leads, not recommendations. Verified picks will appear on our Marrakesh burger city page. The Burger Breton restaurants hub lists every city we cover, including burgers in Rabat and burgers in Casablanca.
How I researched this profile
Every fact here comes from a named source checked on 12 October 2026. No claim rests on an unsourced visit.
I relied on the operator’s official pages (Cenizaro’s About page and its 24 October 2019 press release), trade and travel press (Le Journal des Palaces, Travel Daily, Travel Weekly Asia, Afar, Spanish Sabores) and Moroccan and French media for Meryem Cherkaoui (Bladi.net, Made in Marseille, Medias24, TelQuel). Two of those sites, Medias24 and TelQuel, blocked access, so I used only what their search snippets showed. Where sources disagree, I name the source behind each version.
FAQ about La Maison Arabe Marrakech
Who founded La Maison Arabe in Marrakesh, and when? According to Cenizaro, Hélène Sébillon-Larochette and her daughter Suzy founded it as a restaurant in 1946, with backing from Pasha Thami El Glaoui.
Is La Maison Arabe a hotel or a restaurant? Both. It began as a restaurant in 1946 and has been a riad hotel with restaurants since its 1998 reopening. Ask the hotel directly whether non-guests can book dinner.
What food does La Maison Arabe serve? Does it serve burgers? It serves Moroccan cuisine and a French, Moroccan and Asian menu. Its reported specialties are pastilla, tagines and lamb with dried fruit. No source mentions a burger.
How much does a cooking class at La Maison Arabe cost? The last published prices, from 2016, were quoted in euros: €28 per person for a group class and €455 for a private half-day class for 1 to 6 people. Ask the hotel for the current price in dirhams (MAD).
Which famous people ate at La Maison Arabe? The operator names Ernest Hemingway, Jackie Kennedy, Rita Hayworth, Queen Ingrid of Denmark and Winston Churchill. No independent record confirms these visits.
Who owns La Maison Arabe today? Cenizaro Hotels & Resorts has run it since 2019. Travel Daily reported that Goldcove Pte Ltd, a subsidiary of Bonvests Holdings, bought it from Prince Fabrizio Ruspoli.
Is Meryem Cherkaoui the chef at La Maison Arabe? No. Her Marrakesh restaurant was Mes’Lalla at the Mandarin Oriental, which closed on 31 July 2017.
Where is La Maison Arabe, and how far is it from Jemaa el-Fnaa? It is at 1 Derb Assehbe, Bab Doukkala, in the medina near the Bab Doukkala mosque, a short walk from Jemaa el-Fnaa.
