From achingly hip treats to chef’s favourites making a comeback, in vogue recipes that are taking social media by storm and lesser-known ingredients suddenly making a splash, there’s a whole lot going on in the food world.
With that in mind, here’s our round up of the 15 coolest things to eat right now.
Basque burnt cheesecake
Think of Basque burnt cheesecake as the cooler and edgier, but no less delicious, cousin of traditional sweet and fluffy baked New York cheesecake. The rule-breaking dessert (scorched edges are actively encouraged) was invented in San Sebastian in Spain’s Basque Country decades ago, but it’s only now that the dish is having its moment in the culinary sun. One taste and you’ll wonder what took it so long. Boasting a barely set, silky-smooth, custardy centre and characteristic crackled and crinkled crème brûlée-like crust (no biscuit base necessary here), this is the sort of pudding that can silence a crowd.
Where to get it: You can try this special dish at THAT Café in Al Bateen. This version comes with mixed berries sauce and has fresh berries on top. Creamy and delicious. And if you don’t like cheesecake, well… we can’t be friends.
Dhs52. Open daily 9am-11.30pm. Al Bateen Garden Towers, Tower C5 (02 633 3316).
Beef Wellington
There’s an old-school revival going on: beef wellington is back. All the rage in the early 2000s, until relatively recently the once iconic wellington might well have been considered passé. In these uncertain, post-lockdown times though there’s something that just feels right about the rich regality, sumptuous luxury and sense of comfort that a fillet of beef wrapped in golden pastry provides.
Where to get it: Order this specialty steak dish online from butchershop.ae, and you’ll be able to select your choice of beef tenderloin coated in pâté and duxelles (mushrooms, onions, shallots garlic and spices) and wrapped in puff pastry. It will be delivered to you vacuum-packed and ready for baking with enough meat to serve four to six people. Invite only your carnivorous pals on this occasion.
Dhs475. butchershop.ae/products/beef-wellington.
Garlic bread crumpets
The phrase ‘best of both worlds’ might well have been invented for garlic bread crumpets, otherwise known as the latest food craze to takeover TikTok. Here we see the quintessentially English teatime treat meeting everyone’s favourite Italian restaurant side dish in an alliance that might well be lasting.
The idea itself is simple: quartered crumpets are arranged in an ovenproof dish, drizzled with melted garlic butter, scattered with parmesan and baked. The genius lies in the way in which the punchy, garlic-flecked butter permeates through the crumpets’ signature holes, drenching them in flavour from top to the bottom. A quick flash in a hot oven turns the cheese gooey and oozy and gives the crumpets a texturally pleasing toasted element.
Where to get it: If you’ve ever wondered if there’s anything better than a dripping-with-butter crumpet, we say fling a pack in your shopping basket, try this trend at home and report back.
Gnocchi in new ways
Reliable, quick-to-cook and family-friendly as it may be, it’s been a while since gnocchi could be considered cool. But much like Sandy (Grease) and Andy (The Devil Wears Prada), the Italian potato dumplings have been given a makeover and the internet is very happy indeed.
The key to gnocchi’s reinvention lies in the cooking method and heads-up: regular boiling or blanching is out. Instead, barbecue fiends advocate slinging fresh gnocchi skewers on a searing hot grill for an end result that’s crispy and crunchy with smoky undertones. A fast-food twist on the traditional preparation method meanwhile sees gnocchi pieces battered and deep-fried to golden, bite-size, nugget-like perfection.
Where to get it: Villa Toscana exudes fancy date night vibes, and one of the best dishes on the menu is the red potato gnocchi. The potatoey pillows are cooked with bagna cauda, garlic, sea urchin pulp and black truffle. The price is a little steeper than the other gnocchi dishes you’ll find in the city, but the flavour is absolutely worth it.
Dhs145. Open Sun-Fri noon-4pm 7pm-11pm. Nation Towers, The St. Regis Abu Dhabi, W Corniche Road (02 694 4553).
Grilled sunflower heads
If you thought that sunflowers were just there to billow cheerily in the garden, TikTok wants you to think again. Foodie hipsters first started talking about munching on grilled sunflower heads last year, but it’s a recent second wave appearance that has really caused a stir with videos of people eating them corn on the cob-style going viral.
Where to get it: To get in on the action you will of course need to be in possession of a sunflower head and ideally one that isn’t fully mature and has light, soft seeds. So, take a trip to the garden centre, and on your return lop the head off the sunflower and peel away the leaves. Drizzle with olive oil, season with salt and pepper and grill, face side down, for 15 minutes. After that, it’s snack time.
High-quality soft drinks at home
Cans of fizzy soda no longer cut it and the days of syrupy sweet juices are well and truly numbered. In their place, fridges are being filled with premium, complex-tasting drinks that feel grown-up. This increased thirst for high-end domestic drinks has been reported around the world, with many attributing the trend to clean living millennials and a post-pandemic desire to spend more time at home.
The movement is very much in evidence in the UAE. Take a quick saunter down the drinks aisle at your local supermarket and you’ll encounter a growing array of soft drinks including flavoured tonic and bespoke botanical-based blends.
Where to get it: Online shop Drink Dry was launched with exactly this shift in attitude in mind and has a well-curated selection of sophisticated soft drinks, from sparkling options to speciality hops, mocktail bundles, aromatic infused sodas and more.
UAE-wide next day delivery on orders placed before noon (except Fri). drinkdrystore.com (056 415 0041).
Honeycomb pasta cake
How do you make pasta more appealing? Why you serve it up in pretty pie form, of course.
Otherwise known as rigatoni pie, honeycomb pasta cake ticks all the right boxes when it comes to social media food trends: easy to prepare, makes a star of everyday ingredients and looks impressive, too.
A carb-fest of a recipe (we’re in real comfort food territory here), blanched rigatoni pieces are packed into a springform cake tin to create the all-important honeycomb effect, before being stuffed with string cheese, doused in sauce, covered with more cheese and baked. Once released from the pan, you’ve got yourself a towering, layered creation that can be sliced as you would a cake. Genius, right?
Where to get it: We’ve yet to spot rigatoni pie on an Abu Dhabi restaurant menu, so until the idea catches on you’ll need to make your own at home which, let’s be honest, is really no hardship.
Omurice
Fashionable omurice only calls for two core ingredients (rice and eggs) and initially the fusion recipe seems rather simple: a light and fluffy Western-style omelette is draped over Japanese fried rice and finished with a little sauce (sometime a rich demi-glace, more often than not ketchup).
Don’t be fooled though, there’s serious skill required to achieve the picture-perfect presentation that has seen the dish become a sensation on social (we’re talking a plump omelette cylinder with a thin, just-set exterior wrapped around a gooey, cheesy interior brimming with flavoursome fried rice).
Where to get it: You could absolutely try this trend at home, just don’t be too hard on yourself if it doesn’t look quite like the photos. Alternatively, you should definitely try Omurice at Samurai Japanese Restaurant. This version (called omelette rice on the menu) comes with a plain omelette draped over fried rice with chicken. Drizzle it with ketchup and you’re good to go.
Dhs35. Open daily, noon-12.30am. Al Nuaimi Tower, Tourist Club Area (02 676 6612).
Pasta chips
Simple to make and dangerously easy to eat, pasta chips might just change the way you snack forevermore. The trend originated on TikTok (where else?) and calls for pasta pieces to be boiled, tossed with olive oil, seasoning and plenty of umami-rich grated parmesan, before being air fried until crisp, crunchy and golden with a pleasingly chewy centre.
As usual with chips (crisps to the Brits, but let’s not get into that one), these are best served with dips. We think you’d be well within your rights to call it a gourmet feast if you offer them with bowls of pasta sauce for dunking – try melty, molten cheese sauce for a riff on mac ’n’ cheese, chilli-spiked marinara or people pleasing pesto.
Where to get it: Get that air-frier on standby, there’s carb-eating to be done.
Pinsa
While an Italian might well snigger into their pre-11am cappuccino at the thought of this hundred-year-old technique being considered a new trend, until recently the Roman-style pizza preparation known as pinsa was relatively unknown outside of its home country.
Now though pinsa is well on its way to going global, with pinsa-style pizzerias proving popular all over the world, including deep-dish loving Chicago (a feat in itself). A long-fermented, hand-stretched and often double baked dough sets pinsa apart from its contemporaries; made from a blend of rice, soy and wheat flours, the result is a crisp and crunchy, thin, bubbly crust that’s lighter and arguably easier for the body to digest than regular dough.
Where to get it: The Pinza version is a cross between pizza and flatbread, and it has fewer calories than a regular pizza so you can dig in guilt free. The totally twisted pinza comes with tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, green, red, and yellow pepper, black olives, wagyu sausage, and basil. While you’re there, have a swing around Umm Al Emarat Park.
Dhs56. Open Sat-Wed 11am-midnight, Thu-Fri 11am-2.30am. Umm Al Emarat Park, Al Mushrif (056 838 5588).
Pure pistachio milk
Put that soy latte order on hold, there’s a new plant-based, gluten and lactose-free milk in town. Pale mint-green pistachio milk is the hipster drink of choice that’s currently pushing oat, almond, coconut and the aforementioned soy milk out of the limelight.
Where to get it: The first brand to launch a pistachio milk in the US and the one that’s on everyone’s lips when the conversation turns to the coolest nut milk around is Táche, a family-run, US-based company founded by half-Persian Roxana Saidi. The good news is that their made-from-Middle Eastern-pistachios milk is available in the UAE courtesy of Kibsons, so you can make up your own mind as to whether this trend is a keeper.
kibsons.com (800 5427667).
Ramen
Before you call us out on it, we’re well aware that it’s not breaking culinary ground to identify ramen as on-trend, but like the broth itself, this one just seems to get better with time. There is also a newish addition to the foodie zeitgeist that goes by the name of TikTok ramen noodles currently being whipped up in kitchens the world over. Here instant noodles are given an upgrade thanks to being stir-fried in a buttery, sweet, soy-sauce-forward sauce, with egg and Kewpie mayo whisked in for good measure. Further additions to the pan are optional, but omitting the sachet of seasoning that comes with the noodles themselves is mandatory.
Where to get it: If the above seems verging on the crazy and you just want to slurp the perfection in a bowl that is ramen done well, look no further than Ziuko. This homey spot has one of the most extensive menus we’ve seen in the capital. There are seemingly endless pan-Asian options, from sushi to dumplings to stone bowls, and of course the all-important ramen. The prawn ramen comes with prawns (of course), fresh beansprouts, nori sheets, corn kernels, mushrooms, half a boiled egg and ramen noodles cooked in chicken broth. Make sure you arrive hungry, since the bowl is big enough to feed an
entire family. And for more ramen see page 42. Slurptastic.
Dhs50. Open daily noon-midnight. Hilli Tower, Near Emirates Islamic Bank, Al Khalidiya (055 696 8177).
Smoked brisket fteer
The King of the smoke, brisket maestro, trailblazer for low-and-slow cooking in the UAE and the force (and all-round good guy) behind Time Out Market Dubai’s Local Fire, Hattem Mattar spent part of the summer out of town launching a The Mattar Farm Egypt pop-up.
And while his signature slow-cooked meats were very much in attendance, we couldn’t help but notice a new, locally-inspired addition to the ensemble in the form of smoked brisket fteer. Unsurprisingly the limited-edition dish featuring that incredibly juicy, insanely tasty pulled meat scattered with cheese and encased in layer upon layer of light, golden pastry sold out every time it made an appearance. So, we’re putting it out there, calling this a trend in the making and asking ourselves (and Hattem) the question: when is smoked brisket fteer going to make its debut in Dubai?
Where to get it: Until that happy day though, carnivores are certainly not short of options for sating cravings for something meaty and delicious at Local Fire, so make a road trip to Dubai and you’ll be one happy diner.
Open Sat-Wed noon-midnight, Thu-Fri noon-1am, Time Out Market Dubai, Souk Al Bahar, Downtown Dubai, timeoutmarket.com/dubai.
Turmeric tofu scramble
Say hello to the dish that’s currently making its mark on brunch menus everywhere. Essentially a vegan version of scrambled eggs, the silky, creamy nature of protein-rich bean curd means turmeric tofu scramble has the potential to taste just as good as the original.
No stranger to it-ingredient lists, turmeric plays a pivotal role in this recipe giving the dish a pleasing (Instagram-friendly) sunshine yellow hue and adding an earthy flavour note. The endless ways in which turmeric tofu can tweaked only adds to its appeal: tomato salsa and black beans take it in a huevos rancheros direction, while maple syrup-drizzled vegan bacon brings a taste of the US to the party.
Where to get it: We’re predicting that you’ll be seeing much more of this dish in the weeks to come, but for now you can tuck into turmeric spiced tofu scramble with portobello mushrooms, avocado, kale and roasted peppers at The Coffee Club as part of its new plant-based menu.
Dhs49, various locations including Al Bateen, thecoffeeclubme.com.
Ube in all dessert forms
For the uninitiated, ube (pronounced “ohh-bae”) is a dark-skinned, purple fleshed yam native to the Philippines. When boiled and mashed the tuberous vegetable has a mild and mellow, slightly nutty flavour and has been used in Filipino desserts for years. As the cuisine has increasingly come to global attention so too has ube, with keen cooks experimenting with the veg-in-dessert idea and Instagram grids lighting up with lavender-hued sweet treats from doughnuts to waffles, macaron to cheesecakes.
Where to get it: For an on-trend taste of the action you can find ube pudding, ube queso loaf, ube bars and pianono ube at Panaderia Bakery: a popular chain of bakeries that serve Filipino breads and delicacies. You can find one of these bakeries all over downtown and Mussafah. We’re all about that purple.
Prices vary. Open daily 5am-1am, locations vary. (052 715 6274) panaderiabakery.ae.
