Kaab el ghzal, cornes de gazelle — Fez, Morocco

Kaab el ghzal — literally “gazelle’s ankle,” and known in French as cornes de gazelle, “gazelle horns” — is a crescent-shaped pastry built from a thin, unsweetened wrapper around a log of sweetened almond paste. It belongs to the wider family of Moroccan almond pastries served with mint tea, and it is usually the first item set out on a tea tray when guests are received. This version comes from Fez, a city closely associated with the pastry and with a certain expectation of finesse in how it is made. The dough is rolled as thin as it can go without tearing, since a thick wrapper would overwhelm the almond filling and make the pastry heavy rather than crisp. The filling itself is a simple paste of ground almonds, sugar, cinnamon and orange blossom water, bound with a little melted butter. To assemble it, logs of almond paste are shaped with tapered ends, laid onto the rolled-out dough, and wrapped before the edges are sealed and trimmed with a pastry wheel to follow the curve of the shape. Each piece is then bent into a crescent and pricked with a needle in a few places so it does not puff up and split during baking, which is kept short and at a moderate temperature so the pastry stays pale rather than browning. The finished pastry should be crisp and only lightly colored on the outside, with a soft almond center. It is generally served plain, though a version rolled in powdered sugar afterward, sometimes called m'fenned, is also common, and the choice between the two is mostly a matter of the household's habit rather than a marker of one version over another.