The winner of the American Express One To Watch Award, as part of Middle East and North Africa’s 50 Best Restaurants 2025, is bringing a fresh perspective to the fine dining scene in Casablanca. Here’s looking at you, Table 3.
Opened in June 2024 in chef Fayçal Bettioui’s childhood neighbourhood, minutes from the home he grew up in, Table 3 is a deeply personal project. After years in the US and Germany, Bettioui returned to his hometown of Casablanca to bring a fresh perspective to Morocco’s fine dining landscape. Inspired by his classical French training and appreciation for Japanese simplicity, the menu pays homage to Morocco’s rich terroir while embracing the precision of global gastronomy.
Bettioui talks about finding inspiration in his childhood, mentors, local produce and surroundings, doing what he loves – and what makes it onto his phone background.
I went to the US at the age of 17 and was a biology major at university. For our parents, to say I wanted to be a chef was a big no-no. In the first month I got to the US, I started working in a restaurant, and it went from there. I took hospitality classes and moved from restaurant to restaurant. I spent more than a decade in Miami and a few years in New York working with chefs including Thomas Keller at Per Se and the late David Bouley at Bouley.
My wife and I decided to go to Germany in 2015. I opened my restaurant, Zur Krone, and we achieved a Michelin star in the first year. As Covid came, we started to think about the future, and I had the idea of trying to open a restaurant back home in Morocco.
A lot of people thought it was a crazy decision to close a restaurant that was successful, but we thought it was a good challenge, and it has been. February 2025 marks two years that we’ve been here in Morocco.
The concept of Table 3 is fine dining, but with predominantly Moroccan products. We have an a la carte menu and a tasting menu, which reflects the journey we’ve been on, including my time in the US and Germany. It’s very different to other restaurants in Casablanca, where there’s a lot of live music and partying – Moroccans love to party! So it’s been challenge to have a restaurant where you sit down for a couple of hours and eat seven courses.
The restaurant is literally 200 metres from the ocean. There’s a huge variety of fish and seafood that comes in every day by boat. We work with the fishermen directly.
We have our own land and grow around 70 per cent of our produce. We have an amazing array of vegetables in Morocco, and we don’t serve a lot of meat on the menu at Table 3. That’s a big difference from Germany where game season is always celebrated.
There’s a dish that hasn’t left the Table 3 menu in eight months, which is tuna and foie gras. They’re both from Morocco – it’s our take on surf and turf.
We recycle everything and mostly use ingredients which are in season. We make sure only to use fish and seafood which is available and are very careful not to over-fish.
It’s a very calm environment in the kitchen. We do have an open kitchen, but I’m a very calm person anyway!
At Table 3, the feeling I want guests to have is one of coming home. Like when you go to somebody’s house and you see the kitchen is open. Perhaps it looks a little stressful with some running around for a minute, but overall, it’s open and relaxed. We want that casual interaction with the customers. Perhaps a guest will leave their table, come to the kitchen and say hi and see what’s going on. That’s all welcomed at Table 3.
Some advice I was given was to do what I feel and what my heart tells me. You don’t want to be doing what everyone else is doing, even if it might not make obvious business sense at first. If it doesn’t work, you pick yourself up and try something else.
I cook what I want to cook and what I want to eat. I made the restaurant the way I wanted it. There were no big investors pushing us to do a certain thing. There’s a lot of heart that has gone into Table 3 and I think people feel that.
I’m inspired by the places I have worked and the people I have worked with, like Thomas Keller. I am also inspired by what is found in the market and the produce. I’m classically trained, but I also love Asian flavours, especially Japanese. Living here [in Morocco] has inspired me in new ways, with new ingredients and products to work with, and I am also inspired by my childhood, with nostalgic flavours and dishes.
Opening a restaurant on my own has been the biggest challenge of my life. The entrepreneurial part is the hardest because no-one teaches you how to do that. You learn how to cook, but you don’t learn how to run a business.
The food at Table 3 is evolving. We’re learning more about where we are and what products we can use and it’s something we’re really excited about.
Being named the American Express One To Watch as part of MENA’s 50 Best Restaurants 2025 is amazing. I have had the email as the background on my phone and I keep looking at it, like I did when we achieved a Michelin star in such a short amount of time. To throw the restaurant out there in the universe, not knowing that anybody would know where we are, was a risk, but we were really hoping it would pay off. And it has. It’s also really great for a restaurant in Africa to be recognised.
The full list of the Middle East & North Africa's 50 Best Restaurants 2025 will be revealed live from Abu Dhabi on Tuesday 28 January. Follow 50 Best on Facebook, Instagram and X to stay in the loop.
