A New Generation of Emirati Dining Is Taking Shape in Dubai
Athar, at Chef’s Society in City Centre Mirdif, and Abra, coming to Etihad Museum, add newer voices to a cuisine long served in heritage settings.
For years, Emirati cooking in Dubai has mostly been served in heritage settings: a restored house in Al Fahidi, a restaurant that recreates the city of the 1960s. Two newer projects take a different route. One has just opened in a shopping centre. The other is planned for a museum.
Athar, in Mirdif
Athar is an all-day Emirati restaurant and specialty-coffee room inside Chef’s Society at City Centre Mirdif, the dining area that also houses Bait Maryam, Bonci and REIF Japanese Kushiyaki. Gulf News described it as recently opened on 8 August; tbreak, writing on 17 August, said it was still soft-launching with no grand-opening date announced.
The name means “imprint”. According to tbreak, the concept draws on the legacy of Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan and on the gathering places of Emirati homes: the majlis, the family table and the dekka, the traditional bench. The menu pairs heritage dishes such as lamb majboos and chicken madrooba with burgers and sandwiches, and ends with date pudding and um Ali. Emirati coffee sits beside filter, espresso and iced drinks.
The cook behind it is Nabhan Al Ali, executive chef of ATHAR by Qlab. His route to the stove was not a straight one. Gulf News profiles him as a 45-year-old former boxer whose interest in cooking began in his mother’s and grandmother’s kitchens. A first restaurant failed in 2009; he went on to train at the SCAFA Culinary Institute in Dubai, built a chain of health-focused restaurants across four emirates and spent years documenting Emirati recipes. His sharing-plate format is meant to echo the communal style of traditional meals, and the pantry is deliberately traditional: Emirati ghee, loomi (the dried lemon or lime) and the bezar spice mix. Recipes should stay unchanged even if presentation is modern, he argues. If people stop cooking the food, he told the paper, “history disappears with it.”
Abra, coming to Etihad Museum
Abra is the more distant project. Fact Magazines reported on 15 July that a contemporary Emirati restaurant of that name is planned for Etihad Museum on Jumeirah Street, with no opening date revealed and no menu released. It will be led by the Emirati chef Sahar Parham Al Awadhi, who also leads dessert and pastry creation at Gerbou. The name comes from the traditional abra boats that cross Dubai’s waterways, standing for movement, connection and storytelling, and the branding also nods to “abracadabra”.
The heritage benchmark
The cooking stays traditional; the room, the pace and the format are what change.
Both newcomers arrive in a city that already has recognised Emirati restaurants. The Michelin Guide’s Dubai listings for Emirati cuisine name three restaurants: Al Khayma Heritage Restaurant, which holds a Bib Gourmand, plus Al-Fanar and Gerbou. Michelin’s inspectors recommend Al Khayma’s lamb machboos for sharing and its luqaimat to finish, and the guide’s feature on luqaimat credits Al-Fanar with keeping a traditional recipe. For a closer look at the first of them, read our visit to Al Khayma in Al Fahidi.
What the new projects change is the setting rather than the repertoire. Athar sits in a mall, serves all day and treats coffee as part of the story; Abra is planned for a museum, under a chef who also leads desserts at Gerbou. Neither appears in the guide’s Emirati list, and Abra has yet to open. If they hold to their briefs, they would add a more casual, more contemporary layer to a cuisine that Dubai has so far mostly met at the tables of heritage restaurants. Anyone wanting to cook the dish at the centre of that table at home can start with our Emirati machboos recipe.
What to watch
Two questions will decide how much weight these projects carry. The first is whether Athar, which has yet to announce a grand opening, settles into a permanent place in Mirdif’s dining scene and keeps its traditional pantry intact as it grows. The second is whether Abra, which has no opening date and no published menu, arrives with a point of view distinct from the heritage restaurants around it. Both will be judged against restaurants that have spent years refining their recipes, and against the Michelin Guide’s Emirati list, which for now names just three.
Sources & fact-check7
- Athar: an Emirati restaurant and coffee spot in Mirdiftbreak, 17 August 2026
- How Chef Nabhan Al Ali is preserving Emirati flavours and memories in DubaiGulf News, 8 August 2026
- Abra: a new Emirati restaurant at Etihad MuseumFact Magazines, 15 July 2026
- Dubai: Emirati cuisine restaurantsMICHELIN Guide
- Al Khayma Heritage Restaurant, DubaiMICHELIN Guide
- Luqaimat: the iconic Emirati dessertMICHELIN Guide, 20 February 2024
- Michelin Guide Dubai 2026: Closed restaurants retain stars as new winners emergeThe National, 7 October 2026
Every name, number and date in this story was checked against the sources above before publication. Spotted something wrong? Tell us — we correct errors openly. See our editorial standards.
