What Are Dubai Chocolate Cookies? Origins and How They Vary

Dubai chocolate cookies are a Middle Eastern-inspired dessert built around contrast. The outside is a dark, fudgy, brownie-like cookie with a soft chew. Break one open and you find a green pistachio cream shot through with shredded, toasted phyllo that crackles against the soft dough.

People love them for that mix of textures and for the flavor, which is chocolate with nutty, slightly savory pistachio and a toasty crunch. They look dramatic when halved, and they taste like a candy bar and a bakery cookie at once.

A cracked-open cookie revealing pistachio cream and crispy kataifi filling.

Where Dubai chocolate cookies come from

The cookie is a spin-off of a spin-off, so it helps to start with the bar. Dubai chocolate is a style of milk chocolate bar from the United Arab Emirates, usually listed as invented in 2021. Accounts credit Sarah Hamouda, a British-Egyptian engineer living in Dubai, who wanted a twist on Middle Eastern desserts to satisfy pregnancy cravings. She worked with pastry chef Nouel Catis Omamalin to combine milk chocolate with pistachio, tahini paste and kataifi, the shredded phyllo that gives knafeh its crunch. That filling draws on knafeh, a traditional pastry made across former Ottoman territories.

The cookie came later, and it was not made in Dubai. Most accounts place its start in South Korea in early 2025, where a bakery in Gimpo made a chewy, marshmallow-based version with a pistachio and kataifi filling. In Korea it goes by dujjonku, and the trend was popular enough that bakers reportedly ran short of pistachios and marshmallows. No one seems to know for certain which bakery was first. This is a very recent, social-media-driven dessert, so there is no long folk history to unpack.

How the cookie varies

The original Korean style is built on marshmallow, which gives a soft, almost mochi-like wrapper around the filling. It was shaped to suit a local taste for chewy desserts.

The version we cook on Meez comes from buttermilk, and it takes a different route. It uses a chewy brownie-style cookie dough stuffed with pistachio cream and shredded phyllo, aiming to capture the flavors of the Dubai bar in cookie form. That makes it closer to a classic American chocolate cookie than to the Korean original.

Beyond that, home bakers make their own choices. Some fill with a pistachio cream that leans on tahini, as the bar does, and others keep it purely sweet. Some use milk chocolate for a candy-bar feel, others dark chocolate to balance the sweet filling. A flaky salt finish or a drizzle of melted chocolate is a common modern addition. The traditional anchors are pistachio and crisp kataifi, and the rest is open to taste.

When to make them

These are something sweet for the moments when a plain cookie will not do. Bake them for a Sunday afternoon project, a dessert plate at a small dinner, or a gift box for a friend who likes pistachio. They suit a bake sale table well, because they look striking and hold their shape.

They are not tied to a season, but they shine in the cooler months, when turning on the oven feels welcome. A weeknight in October, with apples, pears and figs at the market, is a good fit. So is a December cookie swap, when citrus and pomegranates are at their best. Pistachio and chocolate also work well alongside winter fruit.

Hands wrapping cookie dough around a pocket of pistachio filling.

What to serve with them

Strong black coffee or Turkish coffee. Its bitterness cuts through the rich chocolate and the sweet pistachio cream.
Cardamom or mint tea. A nod to the Middle Eastern roots, and a lighter, more fragrant pairing.
Cold milk. The classic partner for a fudgy cookie, and it softens the richness.
Fresh citrus or pomegranate seeds. Their tartness gives a bright contrast on a dessert plate, especially in winter.
A scoop of plain vanilla ice cream. Serve it with a cookie that is still slightly warm for a quick dessert.

Make them at home

Ready to bake? Get the recipe for the full ingredient list and method, or cook it step by step in Cook Mode if you want your hands free while you work.

Questions about Dubai chocolate cookies

Were Dubai chocolate cookies invented in Dubai?

No. The chocolate bar they are based on was created in Dubai around 2021, but the chewy cookie most accounts trace to a South Korean bakery in early 2025. It borrowed the pistachio and kataifi flavors of the bar.

How is the cookie different from Dubai chocolate?

The bar is a milk chocolate shell filled with pistachio-tahini cream and crisp kataifi. The cookie puts similar flavors inside a soft, chewy dough instead of a snappy chocolate shell.

What is kataifi?

Kataifi is shredded, spun phyllo pastry, used in knafeh and other Middle Eastern sweets. Toasted, it turns crisp and gives these cookies their crunch.

What is dujjonku?

Dujjonku is the Korean name for the chewy Dubai chocolate cookie. It usually refers to the marshmallow-based version that went viral in South Korea.

Sources

Last reviewed October 20, 2026. Written by the Meez editorial team with Meez Magic, from the sources above.