I’ve not been to Dubai and don’t have a strong desire to go. My position isn’t hard and fast these days, though: a few years ago, I’d wave away the idea as dismissively as the notion of Palace selling Jean-Philippe Mateta to Man United (why would he join a lesser club?). These days, I’m more indifferent.
Were an interesting trip to crop up with the possibility of doing that enormous zip line, tour a fabulous mosque and mooch about in the desert on an angry camel, I could be swayed. The view from the Burj Khalifa looks all right, so too Dubai Creek. I’m much less inclined to hire a yellow Lamborghini and do drugs with a relocated City trader, which I hear is as vital a component to Dubai as anything else.
They do chocolate now, too, far more tame but no less indulgent. Dubai chocolate is everywhere, a phenomenon in creamed nuts. It was launched by Fix Dessert Chocolatier in 2021 and slowly started garnering attention, reaching Europe a year or two ago. Now it’s taken off with unruly panache.
TikTok sparked a frenzy in the west – some influencers enjoyed millions of views. Now sales have boomed and producers can’t make enough. Even people over 30 are catching up. My editor has heard of it, remarkably.
For those still unaware, Dubai chocolate has a textured filling made of knafeh and pistachio. Knafeh is a traditional Arab pudding, eaten in Palestine, Jordan and beyond, that’s made with thin spun pastry (a little filo-like) and layered with soft cheese and a sweet syrup called attar. The chocolate version doesn’t feature cheese, only crushed or creamed pistachios and the sugary, crisp pastry.
The true mark of a food trend going mainstream is when British supermarkets and European brands get in on the act. Now Lindt is selling its own version in Waitrose and the £10 bars (145g in size) have become so popular that the retailer has imposed a two-bar limit on frantic shoppers, like toilet roll in the height of Covid. When Dubai chocolate was a little more niche, but prized by aficionados, enterprising (see: poundshop Wonkas) would buy in batches and resell at inflated prices.
Selfridge’s version became its fastest-selling confectionery product earlier this year, and, as I write this, Lidl is preparing to launch its own version. A limited run online saw the grocer sell 6,000 bars in an hour. You have to respect the hustle.
All this seems like the perfect set-up for vitriol. Dubai chocolate is low-hanging fruit, an easy thing to ridicule, especially for a cynic like me. But then Le Cordon Bleu sent me two of its bars (yes, freebie alert – here is the disclaimer) and I was swayed. Well, after a bit.
The two neat little boxes sat on my desk for a day or two. I was grateful but nonplussed. Then I went to the gym, forgot to get lunch, and found myself unwrapping the first, the milk chocolate version, a dainty bar splattered in Pollock-like colour.
I found Dubai chocolate to be one of those things that feels uneasy to begin with but you carry on and are enraptured – like sex or the Stone Roses. A new, tantalising situation that I soon learned to love.
It is an acquired taste, I suppose. Take good milk chocolate (I was gifted a dark chocolate version too, but I have little time for dark chocolate – the Mayans leaned on milk for a reason), mix it with fine pistachios and even finer pastry, and it isn’t hard to see why it’s proven to be such a hit. It’s original, it’s interesting; it’s another branch of Middle Eastern adventure, familiar enough to comfort but new enough to momentarily unsettle.
An old travel journalist once told me, “Morocco is India for beginners”. At the time I thought it was a boring and racist comment but I find myself thinking about how Dubai chocolate might be a gateway drug getting people into more interesting Middle Eastern food.
Will I visit Dubai? I’d sooner return to Morocco or India. But damn, the chocolate is good. It’s a craze I can fully get behind. The Lamborghini of sweet treats.
