Indeed. Fads being what they are. I've seen people on TV mimicking the ingredients for interesting desserts, but I think the point of the Dubai chocolate must be the proportions. They're stuffed like a truffle, almost, and the texture isn't that common outside of the Middle East. But most people know mass produced chocolate and perhaps even the quality of the chocolate impresses them.

My favorite is Chuao Chocolatier, which is in Southern California, but can be acquired in Australia, though I'm sure you have great chocolatiers there too.

At $14.99 a bar, not something that's going to jump into my shopping cart in a big hurry!!

I took a few minutes to check some high rated brands and found the ingredients defective on all of them. Perhaps, also, you got a knock-off, not the real thing. Check out the Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dubai_chocolate#:~:text=Dubai%20chocolate%20was%20invented%20in,syrup%20and%20a%20soft%20cheese).

One store had them priced at $19.99 each! Another store had them on sale at $12.99.

One of my favorite chocolates is the dark chocolate chunks our creamery uses in their ice creams. I even asked what brand hoping I could buy it but they said it was just a commercial brand of choc that comes in like 20 lbs... didn't sound like an issue for me!

I am determined to hate any trend that costs that much. Then I read about the ingredients and thought it sounds pretty great. Still won't buy it though.

I found some on sale and took them to a gathering to see what friends though. It was good, but maybe I expected too much from the hype.

I bought a bar in Ireland of all places, I agree basically with what colleenoz said that it was nice but I wouldn’t rave about it.

" I am determined to hate any trend that costs that much. "

I 'm determined to ignore all trends and have done so for as long as I can remember.

I saw this stuff for sale in a podunk local Food Lion grocery store and couldn't believe my eyes. I was so shocked I took a pic. Not sure who they are expecting to buy it around here; it looked like the display unit had had some sales, but that could just be from clever/sneaky rearrangement of the product to look like it was popular. There is a whole art to that sort of thing...welcome to advanced capitalism. There were two rows below this one fully packed. So it once had at least 60 X $15 of product in this ugly gilt cardboard display case - close to one grand at retail!

I thought to myself, "hopefully is it made with authentic South Asian slave labor!" You know, for the full Dubai experience!

Interestingly when I was back in this store a couple weeks later (took pic in August) I didn't see this display anymore. Maybe they sold out, more likely, at that price, it was sent back to the distribution channel, hoping to find somewhere else to hawk it. I hardly ever eat Lindt chocolate anymore - felt sophisticated when I was a teenager in the early 1990s ;-). But I'll remember this BS.

I had no idea it was a trend. I rarely even recognize trends. But my friend's mom happened to be in Dubai and brought home a candy bar from there. My friend is trying not to eat sugar so she gave it to me. I think the name was Fix. Anyway, it was a serious solid candy bar with some heft to it. It was squares of chocolate, although it was caramel colored. It had wafers and filling. It was very good. I have no idea what it cost. I got my friend to try one of the squares just to know how good it was.

Absolutely not. I despise pistachios.

We were given some and were not impressed. Too sweet, bar too thin, chocolate too soft, filling like eating gritty, sugary compost.

Sounds like murraysmom might of had the original, based on the Wiki link Pillog shared. It and knockoff similar flavor combinations seem to have infiltrated everywhere (I was in Europe over the summer, and even saw a gelato flavor). The Wiki link was very informative. Interesting that is was spread solely through influencers and social networking (TikTok), primarily out of the influencer epat haven (notoriously income tax free, for those who were not aware). Interesting that is is less costly to produce due to the chocolate crisis, hench the proliferations of knockoffs. (I've had a knockoff).

I just opened this thread after coming from the AI/Chat GPT post...and my first thought was, I know I've read that a lot of this alleged Dubai chocolate is not actually from Dubai.

My poor little brain - my first thought anymore is, "it's all fake!" Trust nothing, believe no one.

And when you trust your television
What you get is what you got
'Cause when they own the information, oh
They can bend it all they want

Interesting…I’ve not seen or heard anything about it.

A different topic but it does involve chocolate. I’ve also not seen this Black Cocoa Powder.

Black Velvet Cupcakes

How does that old saying go? “There’s a sucker born every second”? Well, judging by what I’ve heard, we’ve got enough suckers out here to fill a stadium every hour if it's a trend. I mean, $20 for a knockoff chocolate bar from Dubai? Please. That thing has about as much cocoa as a cardboard box dipped in cocoa-scented perfume. Honestly, I’ve had more satisfying desserts fall out of vending machines in gas stations.

And don’t even get me started on the idea of cheesecake from the Congo. Sounds exotic, right? Yeah—exotically terrifying. Might as well wash it down with a mystery meat smoothie from a back alley in Uzbekistan.

I don’t eat anything made outside the good old USA. Not now, not ever. Why? Because I like my food without a side of mystery industrial solvents.” There are confirmed reports of products from other countries containing things like lead, pesticides, and unidentified crunchy bits that scientists are still trying to name.

I’ll stick to American-made snacks, thank you. At least when I eat junk food here, I know the preservatives will kill me slowly and predictably—and are listed on the package.

Do you not travel outside the US, kevin9408?

There are not only knock offs on Amazon, etc., but I've found a lot of fake and scam websites claiming to be the real thing. As far as I know the below are authentic:

Fix Dessert Chocolatier (Wikipedia says it's the original) from Fix Dessert website: https://officialfixdessertchocolatier.com/products/can-t-get-knafeh-of-it-hero-pack-of-12

For a 12-pack, the bars are $10 apiece (but then there's temperature controlled shipping). The fancy chocolate bars from California which I like are $6.50 apiece from my farm service, shipping included, though shipping (because it's chocolate) is extremely expensive if you order it from the maker, so maybe competitive.

From SGFR store in Singapore (the best place I could find the nutrition and ingredients info):

Made in Dubai

Every 50g of Can't Get Knafeh of It-Hero Contains;
- Energy: 250-300 kcal
- Protein: 10-12 g
- Fat: 18-20 g
- Saturated fat: 12-14 g
- Carbohydrates: 30-35 g
- Sugars: 20-22 g
- Sodium: 200-250 mg

Ingredients
Milk Chocolate (Sugar, Cocoa Butter, Skimmed Milk Powder, Cocoa Mass, Lactose, Milk Fat, Emulsifier (Soy Lecithin), Flavoring (Vanillin), Knafeh (Kunafa) (Wheat Flour, Sugar, Cornstarch, Vegetable Oil, Salt, Acidity Regulator (Citric Acid), Artificial Flavor (Vanilla), Pistachio, Tahini Paste (Sesame Seeds, Sugar, Water, Salt)
Allergen : Contains Milk, Nuts, Gluten

So that makes the real ones, from Fix Dessert Chocolatier: Milk chocolate, shredded filo, sugar, cornstarch, oil, salt, citric acid, lab vanilla, pistachio, sesame paste.

On Amazon:

UniqBite Dubai Chocolate Bar, 7 oz $20 (from Turkey):: Sugar, Pistachio, Cocoa butter, Whole Milk Powder, Kataifi (Wheat Flour, Water), Cocoa Mass, Ghee, Vegetable Oil (Palm), Demineralized Whey Powder, Emulsifiers (Sunflower Lecithin, Soy Lecithin), Colorants (Green, Tartrazine, Safflower), Flavoring (Vanilin) -- no sesame

Beemax $19 7oz Dubai Style Chocolare (from Turkey): Milk Chocolate (51%) with Kadayif and PIstachio Cream (49%) Sugar, Pistachio, Cocoa Butter, Whole Milk Powder, Kadayif (Wheat Flour, Water), Cocoa Mass, Ghee Butter, Vegetable Oil, Whey Powder, Emulsifiers (Sunflower Lecithin, Soy Lecithin) Colorants (Green, Tartrazine, Safflower), Vanillin Flavoring -- no sesame

Dubai Gold (dark) Chocolate $26 for 4.6 oz. (from California) (Thre's also milk, below ,and white)

DARK CHOCOLATE, (CHOCOLATE, SUGAR, COCOA BUTTER, MILK POWDER, SOY LECITHIN), WHITE CHOCOLATE, MANUKA HONEY, PISTACHIOS, WATER, SALT, PISTACHIO PASTE, PISTACHIO OIL, TAHINI (SESAME SEEDS), ROASTED KATAIFI (SHREDDED FILLO DOUGH). -- Dark chocolate and honey variation, does have sesame, sounds good and "clean" but what a price!

Dubai Gold Chocolate $26 for 4.6 oz. (from California) MILK CHOCOLATE, (CHOCOLATE, SUGAR, COCOA BUTTER, MILK POWDER, SOY LECITHIN), WHITE CHOCOLATE, MANUKA HONEY, PISTACHIOS, WATER, SALT, PISTACHIO PASTE, PISTACHIO OIL, TAHINI (SESAME SEEDS), ROASTED KATAIFI (SHREDDED FILLO DOUGH). -- This one is milk chocolate, still with the honey (with milk chocolate??) same horror price

I can't find the really awful ones I saw on best lists the other day. Several had no filo (kadayif or kataifi). Most had no techina (sesame). One had chemical dyes, many had foods for dyes/color. So many were really yucky. Ghirardelli has Dubai style individually wrapped chocolate drops. Lindt has their version of a bar. The above are just a smattering to show what kinds of ingredients you'll find and how much they veer from the original. Interesting that the California one went to all the trouble to make a more pure bar, then messed it up with different kinds of chocolate (okay, marketing, I guess) and wrecked it with manuka honey (more marketing? An excuse to bump up the price? Am I the only one who thinks it's obnoxious with milk or white chocolate?)

" filling like eating gritty, sugary compost. "

LOVE THIS!

"I don’t eat anything made outside the good old USA."

FWIW, Europe and civilized parts of Asia (not China, of course) have food quality standards that are as high or higher than US ones.

I had a tenant suddenly move out. I Googled her name...she started her own bakery out of her rental home...against the lease she'd signed. She's making Dubai chocolate cake. She's getting GREAT reviews....BTW. I haven't tried it....yet...

This sounds like some 'influencer' got one over BIG on a ton of people---AGAIN! Two years ago I had a 6th grader telling me about some cookie her dad brought her home from his trip into Mpls. Crispy Cream all over again with these cookies. I've never had one, I can't even tell you their name but pigs will fly before any cookie is worth the price of these things.

I've seen it but never tried it. My coffee comes from Costa Rica, my favorite pasta from Italy (if I don't make my own), my husband will eat New Zealand lamb and I've even been known to buy an avocado from Mexico, I'm not above eating food from another country. Just try to find coffee from America. There's Hawaiian but it's pretty expensive as a daily drink and I really like my morning coffee.

Since I've also been known to drink a Diet Coke and splurge on an A&W chili dog and will eat bacon in spite of the nitrates and nitrites, I'm clearly not completely adverse to the additives, although I try to moderate their consumption. Sometimes.

I just can't pay that amount for that, I don't want it badly enough or I'm not curious enough, or something. I can afford it but it's just too expensive for what it is, at least to me.

I don't have any problem at all, of course, if other people choose to buy it, hopefully they will enjoy it.

@floral_uk z.8/9 SW UK - I agree with you. The food in the UK and the EU is far superior to US slop.

I agree that the national legal standards here aren't as strict, though some localities have stronger ones, but that doesn't mean all the food is "slop". It just requires being informed and wanting better than cheap, dead food.

@arcy_gw wrote: "Two years ago I had a 6th grader telling me about some cookie her dad brought her home from his trip into Mpls. Crispy Cream all over again with these cookies. I've never had one, I can't even tell you their name but pigs will fly before any cookie is worth the price of these things."

Probably crumbl. One opened here a year or two ago and some people who've moved here from other places were SO excited. So some of the locals tried them and gave them a big thumbs down. We have several really, really great local bakeries that make wonderful cookies. There was a big push to get people to patronize the small, local businesses and have reasonably priced, top quality cookies instead of corporate chain food.

Same thing happened with places like jersey mikes and some other sandwich chain. We have really top quality local sandwich shops that are very well loved, long term small businesses. The only ones going to the national chains are pretty recent transplants. I don't know anyone else who goes to them.

We are a fierce "buy local" "support small business" community. Many of us hate seeing these mediocre chains move in and seeing our unique community slowly (or rapidly) being turned into a place like every corporate driven city. It's going to be a sad day, if, when they succeed.

When my boys were small, I always made cookies from scratch. Who knew kids could get so excited to have the same stuff their friends were eating, Oreo’s, Keebler chocolate chip, Twinkies, Hostess cupcakes, etc.

I still made most from scratch, but I did buy some junk occasionally.

Now, my oldest is a fantastic cook and cooks from scratch, stuff I would not even think to try.

Even now, sometimes my husband and I get a craving for something, well very 60’s or 70’s. Once in a while does not hurt anything.

I'm curious. I saw some "Dubai style" chocolates at an outlet store the other day and assumed they are knock-offs due to the word "style" but the photo above posted by by UpperBayGardener of Lindt chocolates says "Dubai style" as well. Do actual Dubai chocolates say Dubai STYLE?

"Do actual Dubai chocolates say Dubai STYLE?"

Of course, don't you know that Dubai is the most "stylish" place on Earth!?

No. Style are indeed the knock offs.

This is the real one. Fix Dessert Chocolatiers. Scroll down to see the individual bar.

https://officialfixdessertchocolatier.com/products/can-t-get-knafeh-of-it-hero-pack-of-12

I had the Fix bar and it was definitely by and from Dubai. I wish I had saved the wrapper. I didn't know it was a "thing".

Floral, the issue with so-called "nanny states" like the UK, as well as institutions like the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union, is their tendency to ban ingredients they think might be dangerous — as mentioned in the article you linked. That same article also notes that the UK is considering scrapping up to 2,400 EU laws that are seen as intrusive and overly protective — part of the reasoning behind Brexit in the first place.

If there's public outcry in the UK over American meat imports, that frustration should be directed at the UK buyers and importers choosing to bring it in. It’s not America’s problem. If people don’t want it, they simply shouldn't buy it.

Here in the U.S., we enjoy our meat — and personally, I’d be happy to see exports stop altogether if it meant lower demand and lower prices at home. American meat is not low quality; quite the opposite. It’s graded by the USDA so that buyers can choose the level of quality they want. The use of antibiotics in livestock doesn't equate to poor quality either. Honestly, the outrage reminds me of the absurd image of a group of cannibals refusing to eat someone just because they've been vaccinated for COVID-19 — it’s laughable.

from plllog's link. Nothing about this looks the least bit appetizing to me....

Mine did not look like that. It was a sort of caramel color on the outside with some dark chocolate drizzle. The inside was a sort of wafer with crushed pistachio paste. It was very tasty. The color of the above looks way off.

It was actually nice, but not stellar IMO. If someone offered me some, I wouldn't say no. The toasted kataifia pastry shreds gave it a pleasant crackle. Dark chocolate would have made it better IMO but I find milk chocloate pretty resistable.

Yes, @outpaientzero, US meat and other foods are such high quality they have to have frequent recalls due to contamination.

" Yes, @kevin9408, US meat and other foods are such high quality they have to have frequent recalls due to contamination"

That is not a reflection of the quality of the meat but rather a processing plant issue. That can happen anywhere in the world, as alluded to up-thread.

American ranchers produce beef that can go toe-to-toe, and I'd argue surpass, that from any other country in the world. End of discussion. If you've never had a Prime cut of steak from U.S. born and bred beef cattle fresh from the butcher, you don't know what you're missing, and you certainly don't know squat about just how superb U.S. beef can be.

I dunno. Argentina has a wonderful reputation for their beef... And people rave about real kobe and wagyu from Japan.

I'm sure it can be superb. I don't think the top quality stuff is what would be exported. It's the stuff grown on giant feed lots or in battery poultry houses under factory farming conditions, using growth promoters, routine antibiotics, pesticides and additives banned in Europe, tight confinement such as gestation or farrowing crates and having to be sanitized after slaughter because of the high bacterial load.

Floral, I definitely see the growing problem with the EU's overreach and excessive regulations, it's getting to the point where it feels like almost everything is being banned. I also care about healthier food, which is why I try to grow as much of my own as possible, so I understand your concerns.

That said, new issues are emerging, there's now a growing black market in the EU for illegal pesticides that were banned decades ago, many of which are also banned in the U.S. because they've been proven harmful. That’s not a good direction either.

The EU’s new Green Deal is shaping up to be a train wreck for the agricultural sector, I’m sure you’ve seen the farmers protesting in the news. They’re being pushed into a corner with no real way out, which will ultimately mean fewer farmers, higher food prices, and increased reliance on imports.

Take potatoes, for example. When the EU banned the last effective pesticide against wireworms in 2022, (still used in the USA and other countries) many farmers started losing between 10% to 50% of their harvest. That led to a surge in potato imports in 2024, and it’s only going to get worse.

I’ve seen it firsthand. Here’s damage from wireworms in my own garden this year. Crop rotation doesn’t help much since wireworms can survive in the soil for up to five years. I do rotate potatoes in a field to reduce worm populations but still ended up losing 80% of the crop. I moved my potatoes to a new field five years ago, and must find a clean field for next year with low wireworm populations.

This is what wireworms do from my own garden this year with no pesticides.

This isn't the 1700's when the EU population was a quarter of what is is now where 80% of the people were farmers. Now it's only 4% and they are feeding 4 times as many people. The EU is putting excessive pressure on these farmers to produce and trying to take agriculture back to the 1700's. At some point the train wreck will crash with negative consequences with the EU's new green deal and more food will require more imported food from who knows where.

Plllog, I see on this morning's news that we are probably going to import more beef from Argentina to drive down beef prices.

The US beef supply has been compromised by droughts out west, a screw worm outbreak in Mexico and tariffs on Brazil. It's going to take beef growers a while to build herds back up that were downsized because feed was not available due to drought. So, if I have a calf this year, it will have to grow for two years before it can be bred and 9 months later have a calf which will not be big enough to slaughter for 18 months or so.

I can raise a chicken in 7 weeks but it'll take me closer to 5 years to get beef if I start with young breeding stock.

And, in keeping with the original subject of this thread, I saw a whole table full of the Dubai chocolate knockoffs at Marshall's for sale. I still didn't buy any but I should have gotten a couple of bars for the granddaughters who are still young enough to trick or treat. Maybe I'll stop again before Halloween, it didn't seem to be selling very quickly so there may be some left.

Annie

Flora's in England, I think? and I'm in France. French regulations and use of pesticides is more stringent even than the rest of the EU which makes life very hard for French farmers.

We go to great lengths to buy locally produced / caught food. But, we do live in a really privileged region. We have some of the best meat, veg and fish in the country just on our doorstep.

Apart from fruit like oranges, pineapples and other exotics and some veg, there's very little I can't get locally.

Even our frozen food shop has maps of France showing exactly where it was grown and packaged.

I'm sure that in the US you get some amazing produce and meat. I've never understood why you pay for cheese, for example, to be imported from Europe. You must have some wonderful producers.

Flora's right when she talks about the awful stuff that governments have wanted to have dumped on the UK market, talking about trade deals with the US. Brexit has a lot to answer for. I think the market has resisted these imports up til now.

Really cheap food is sadly not going to have the same standards as more expensive. Sadly it"s the animals that suffer with those enormous factory farms. I don't want to buy meat where the animal hasn't been respected and had a decent life. Above, Kevin (?) was talking about it being ok to stuff animals with antibiotics. This is awful for humans and is only necessary where the animals are living in less than ideal conditions.

Absolutely! California has stricter regulations than many other states, but even so, they're compromises that get rid of the horrors, but not by a big margin. We also vote with our wallets, however. People are appalled by what I pay for eggs, but they're from pastured chickens who can peck all day, as chickens should. And it's worth banning the forever chemicals like the ones that worked great, but poisoned the ocean.

Re the picture Olychick posted from the "real" link, it's all real ingredients except for Vanillin, which is chemically identical to real vanilla (or so I've read). The more appetizing looking bars have dyes, thickeners, etc. Like in the early days of the tea trade, the Chinese companies learned that the British liked their tea leaves green, so they added chemical pigments like you put in paint! Some of them are somewhat toxic. When the British people found out, as a group they said no thank-you, we'll have black tea leaves.

Another problem with routinely using antibiotics on agricultural animals is that it raises antibiotic resistance in the various bacteria.