Eating out in Dubai - Dining Around Dubai with FooDiva and the Entertainer Dubai Fine Dining App

When I saw in my inbox an email from FooDiva I thought it was the newsletter that, being a subscriber, I regularly receive with updates on the newest reviews published on the website. But the incipit was quite peculiar as it said "Good morning Francesca! This is your lucky day! You are the winner of a spot on the invitation-only Entertainer and FooDiva Dine Around Dubai.." . Winner? Me? Of what? Why?
I had to think twice to understand - or better to remember - what she was talking about. I never win anything and for this reason I'm not used to enter competitions, of any kind, especially if I have to fill forms with lots of information. But this time I had actually entered a competition and, unbelievable, won. And won the best prize!
In fact few weeks ago, one of the mail from FooDiva was about the launch of a new Entertainer product, the Dubai Fine Dining App and guide; in particular the mail said that, in occasion of the launch, FooDiva had been asked to organize a tailored invitation-only dinner on Palm Jumeirah, during which guests would visit four restaurants with different cuisine, all in the same evening. Readers were invited to a enter a competition for getting the chance to win ten apps for the Entertainer Dubai Fine Dining 2015 guide, and one invitation to the exclusive dinner with FooDiva and the Entertainer around Palm Jumeirah. Since prizes sounded interesting and there was no complicated form to fill - just saying the name of the favorite restaurant on Palm Jumeirah and why, and of course leaving the email address - I answered ... and won. So I had the opportunity to join the special dining tour around Palm Jumeirah with FooDiva and other nice guests.

Eating out in Dubai - where to eat fresh, organic, locally grown food ... seating outdoor (if you like)

Considering how long I've been living in Dubai (one year and a couple of months now), I still feel pretty new in the city, with many things to do and places and opportunities yet to discover. But I'm working on the task of getting more and more acquainted with the city, as I want to enjoy as much as possible of it during the time I'll have the opportunity to stay here. And one of the important chapters of my personal guide to the city is with no doubts the one dedicated to "where to eat out", in the possible different occasions. One of my family's routines is going out for lunch on weekends, an habit we've always had, also when we lived in Italy and my son wasn't born yet (though at that time we opted for a different kind of places...). Having a two and a half old boy dining with us, we cannot indulge in multiple-courses gourmet lunches, since we probably couldn't completely enjoy. But even if in most cases we have quick meals out, we try to avoid as much as possible fast food- like places, our favorites being  restaurants or, even better for lunch, cafes and bistros where it is possible to have well prepared and presented quality food, good service, nice ambience, possibly fair prices...and the possibility to eat outside is another much appreciated feature. A bit demanding? Maybe, but considering how many options are available in Dubai, I think I can select.

My DinnerTime experience

A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to try the service offered by DinnerTime ME, the local branch of an international company founded in Sweden few years ago and recently arrived in the Middle East, whose purpose is to provide families with fresh ingredients and instructions to prepare four creative meals during the week. How does it work? Every week DinnerTime's team creates a four meals set menu, buys all the fresh ingredients required (and some cupboard staples more unlikely to be always available in your pantry) and delivers right to your door in a time slot chosen by you, together with all the instructions to prepare the recipes. All you have to do is to check DinnerTime's website to view in advance the menu planned for the following week and, if you like it, place your order - online, by phone or email - by Thursday; on the following Sunday, at the chosen time, you'll receive your box.
To be honest, I wouldn't have ordered from DinnerTime on purpose, as I like to plan meals for my family by myself, selecting new recipes to try or, even more often, deciding what to cook on the basis of the fresh food - mainly vegetables and fish - I bought (and I buy only what inspires me, usually because is fresh, local, organic if possible, and somehow tempting me). But I received a DinnerTime voucher as a gift from the beautiful online magazine Food e Mag dxb, a food and travel e-magazine authored by local bloggers, (you can register on the website to have a chance to receive a gourmet gift) and was happy to try. 

The Farmer's Market on the Terrace in Dubai

When I was about to move from Italy to Dubai one year ago, one of the (many) things I started wondering about was what kind of food I would have eaten daily. I was not much concerned about the availability of food, or the possibility to find products I was used to; on the contrary I thought I would have found a much wider variety of foodstuffs, thanks to the multicultural city that Dubai is. My thoughts were more related to the quality and origin of what I was going to buy, cook and eat. Given local weather conditions and characteristics, my idea was that not much could be grown locally with the consequence that most of supplies had to fly from all over the world to local supermarkets. My ideal of food shopping is a bit different though: I prefer to buy products, especially the fresh ones, with a supply chain as short as possible; if it where possible I would buy everything directly from growers and producers (have a look at my profile to know what I think, and have always thought, about the food I want to eat). This habit of mine takes origin mainly from my family's costumes: when I was a child part of the fruits and vegetables we consumed at home where grown by my grandparents in their farm, together with olives for making oil and grape for wine; and so eggs, chicken and other foodstuffs. What they didn't produce came mainly from other local, small, family-run farms. Many years later my mom still buys the food for the family as much as possible in the same way, and living very close to the countryside the task is quite easy for her. I moved from there long time ago and lived for many years in some of the biggest cities in Italy, Milan for a long time than Turin for a while before coming to Dubai. But the way I used to buy food didn't change much: fruits and vegetables from farmers (in Turin I was so lucky! I had a daily farmer market at five minutes walking from where I lived), olive oil directly from producers (in each Italian region it's possible to find different types of olive oils), and the same grains, wine, pasta, cheese, and actually most of the food we had. It was also a good excuse to travel and go out of the city during weekends. I love seeing first hand where and how food is grown and produced, talking with producers, knowing the people behind what we eat and also tasting new products and knowing different ways to use products.
So when moving to Dubai, I thought I had to give up this way of shopping and convert to supermarket; also I thought that some products would have been available but absolutely overpriced.
My main concern was related to vegetables since, even if we are not a vegetarian family, we make a really huge consumption of vegetables, of all varieties. And eating stuff coming from hundreds miles away, plus pricey, was not an attractive idea to me...
But luckily I was completely wrong! Because Dubai has a unique, real, farmers market, and finally the new season has just started: last Friday, November 28th, The Farmer Market On The Terrace officially returned and will be held every Friday till the end on May in a beautiful location, an avenue shaded by palm trees in the Ballroom Gardens at Jumeirah Emirates Towers.

Pasta Master Class with chef Claudio Sadler

I couldn't have had a better occasion than this to inaugurate a new section of the blog where, besides recipes which remain the protagonists of this website, I want to talk about other food-related experiences worth being remembered and shared. Since the birth of this blog - relatively recent though - I hadn't experienced yet any food event really deserving a detailed review, with the only exception of some restaurants that I visited here in Dubai and really enjoyed, but whose reviews would maybe be superfluous or redundant considering the many and valuable ones already published by others. But the "original" occasion finally came and I am now very happy to talk about it.
During the month of November, more precisely from the 7th to the 20th, Dubai is hosting the sixth edition of the Italian Cuisine World Summit, an event celebrating Italian food and culinary tradition which gathers in the city some of the best and most renowned Italian chefs: the list includes guest master chefs at the helm of prestigious restaurants in Italy but also ambassadors of the Italian cuisine all around the world. The summit program is very intense and absolutely exciting: some of the finest Italian restaurants in Dubai are hosting gala events as well as dinners with special menus created by the Italian visiting chefs; an extensive series of cooking lessons, courses and seminars are being held at different venues, featuring chefs, experts, sommeliers and food writers; events, cooking shows, competitions and more will take place at several locations in the city. Check the summit's website to know the detailed programme or visit Dima Sharif's blog which, having being appointed as the official blog of the event, is following closely what is going on, anticipating upcoming events, introducing chefs, showing what is taking place throughout the summit, including some behind-the-scene. The event is really a great opportunity for Dubai's residents and visitors for having a first-hand experience with top quality Italian cuisine and food tradition, be it a dinner prepared by a celebrity chef or an family-friendly event or a seminar on olive oil (or something else) or a cooking lesson. Among this huge range of possibilities, thanks to Dima's invitation, I had the opportunity to attend a Master Class on dry Pasta held by the Michelin-starred chef Claudio Sadler.