If you’ve looked around and checked some menus, you’d see that “Dubai chocolate” is all the rage. I saw Lindt selling it while leaving the grocery store, the bougie donut shop has a seasonal Dubai chocolate donut, and a cart opened up selling it locally too.

How has pistachio + chocolate been able to inspire such a marketing blitz? Why do 3 real estate conglomerates in a trench coat pretending to be a country need to invent a new dessert? Lastly, since Dubai is close to Iran, where I assume they source their pistachios, shouldn’t all this pistachio stuff be red?

  • git [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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    “Dubai Chocolate” is a euphemism for when sex workers take a shit on some Dubai millionaire’s/billionaire’s chest. This product category was astro turfed to overload the SEO/mindshare to refer to actual chocolate instead.

    I wish I was joking.

  • ClassIsOver [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    It sounds like chocolate that’s from the opposite end of the spectrum from direct-trade, sustainable chocolate, but also on purpose. Does slavery taste better?

  • Lyudmila [she/her, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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    The name is definitely PR bullshit, I think the name comes from the fact that it was popularized on TikTok by a chocolatier in Dubai, rather than any actual connection in terms of the production pipeline. It’s literally just another one of those “some shit that went viral” temporary marketing trends which seem to make up half of the health and beauty section at the store now.

    Having said that, kadayıf and pistachio do combine well with chocolate but it shouldn’t cost any more than a regular chocolate bar. Lindt charging quintuple what their normal bars cost is ridiculous and totally unjustifiable.

    • SoyViking [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      To be fair, the name itself is not anymore bullshit than the name of a lot of other sweet treats. At least it has some connection to the place it’s named after.

  • FourteenEyes [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    I don’t know but they’re trying to charge me 15 fucking dollars for a candy bar so fuck that

    If I’m paying that much it better suck my dick

    • isame [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      I independently, though obviously I knew not originally, came up with ‘for that price it better come with a blowjob’ and have been saying it for like 15 years. I’m just glad to see I’m not the only one.

  • FourteenEyes [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    Also on the red pistachios thing: this is just the absurdity of the confection industry and it’s been that way since its inception. Oh, you have some Swiss chocolate you say? Where in Switzerland did they grow the cacao beans?

  • I’ve seen this around as well and my theory is that this is just one example of chocolate makers trying to get past the price of actual cocoa to make stuff that they can still put a huge price on.

    Notice how this chocolate bar mostly isn’t chocolate at all? But is still called “Dubai chocolate”. Same with all the tens of flavor bars all manufacturers are doing, they are doing it to reduce the amount of chocolate in their chocolate. Many also just use even more sugar now, but call it the same.

    There are shortages and capitalism problems in the colonial industry that is chocolate making. I think this just reflects that and pretends to be something else.

  • Erika3sis [she/her, xe/xem]@hexbear.net
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    Someone bought me some Dubai chocolate a while ago during the peak of the trend. I genuinely really enjoyed it and would’ve wanted more if it weren’t for the price, and also that it isn’t vegan. The packaging said it was made in Turkey, which put me a bit at ease given how messed up Dubai is; nevertheless I found it troubling how something named after freaking Dubai was suddenly everywhere, it definitely rubbed me as an attempt to reform the emirate’s PR and as a very strange trend overall. People looked very silly talking about it like it was the best thing ever.

    Edit: Of course, being made in Turkey is absolutely not a guarantee that the chocolate was produced ethically — it’s still chocolate at the end of the day. I believe that after I finished the piece I was given that I said, “I wonder how hard it would be to make this at home.” Naturally, I also did some research into what the heck kadayif even was, which was an interesting enough tangent.

    • Gosplan14_the_Third [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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      There’s also the factor that Dubai is associated with Luxury, and luxury goods have been popular the last few years. Probably the most since the 1980s.

      Eating 10 €/bar Dubai chocolate is a more affordable Andrew Tate style statement “I’m better than you poors”

      • Erika3sis [she/her, xe/xem]@hexbear.net
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        I vaguely remember getting into an argument with someone a long time ago when he tried to make an analogy about something that basically took it for granted that everybody would prefer a luxury sports car if they could get their hands on one; I said that my own dream car was actually a secondhand VW Golf Mk2 and he pretty much lost his mind about it, because he couldn’t fathom that somebody would prefer the exact opposite of a luxury good. Point is that I sometimes forget that Andrew Tate is how a lot of people think.

  • insurgentrat [she/her, it/its]@hexbear.net
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    There was a trend calling scatological sex work “Dubai chocolate” given the elite’s proliclivites for hiring sex workers for humiliating/extreme sex acts.

    So now we have a stupid chocolate bar shilled by people bought and paid for.

  • SoyViking [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    A while back I bought a tiny bar of Dubai chocolate from my local Arab store to see what the fuss was all about. I love chocolate and I love pistachios. Chocolate with nuts is nice. On paper I should like this.

    The bar was pricey enough but it was a completely underwhelming experience. The filling was a greasy sugary pistachio cream with a very faint flavour of pistachio that was completely drowned out by the chocolate. I might have been unlucky with the specific brand but I did not feel that it was worth the money they charged for it. A bar of chocolate with hazelnuts or gianduia would have been better.

  • plinky [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    when average treatlerite sees opportunity to finance their favorite slave state, they take it.

    (probably people simping for influencers, who launder their money in uae)