Christmas chocolates in Dubai and small gifts to go with them
Camel milk chocolate, a Dubai chocolate bar, Al Ain dates, festive biscuits and a leather keyring with initials.
Small Christmas gifts do a lot of work in December. The teacher, the nursery assistant, the neighbour, the friend who hosts the school-run coffee, the box you carry to someone’s door on Christmas Day. Chocolate is the easy answer, and in Dubai it can also be a local one.
This list gathers the Christmas chocolates Dubai makers produce, with a few small personalised gifts alongside. The high-end pieces come first: camel milk chocolate, a Paris chocolatier reborn in a Dubai atelier with its own Dubai chocolate bar, a proudly Emirati chocolatier and a Dubai maker with a Christmas range of advent boxes and hampers. Then come the small, home-grown makers: an Emirati family’s Al Ain dates, a chocolate factory and café, a small-batch chocolatier, two bakeries and a leather studio that embosses initials. There are no pyjamas this time.
Use it like a shopping list. Count how many small gifts you need, choose one or two makers rather than ten, and order anything personalised first. Each brand links to the product itself, so you can check flavours, allergens and box sizes before you decide. Seasonal ranges change through the year, so look at the product page again before you order.
Before you choose
Count the gifts first. Teachers, assistants, the nanny, the neighbours, the people who look after your building. Write the list before you browse, because small boxes add up quickly, and one maker for the whole list is far easier to order and collect than five. Then add one or two spares for the people you will remember on the last day of term.
Think about the heat. Even in December, chocolate left in a car in Dubai is chocolate at risk. Keep boxes indoors, hand them over the same day, and choose dates or biscuits for anything that has to spend the morning in a school bag.
Read the allergens. Many of these chocolates contain nuts, milk or both, and some may contain traces even when the flavour does not. For a whole class, or a child you do not know well, check the product page or choose something without nuts.
Order personalised pieces early. Names on chocolate boxes, inscriptions on biscuits and initials on leather all take time, and small makers fill up before Christmas. Our guide on when to order Christmas gifts in Dubai sets out what to order first.
Mix eating and keeping. When you are choosing small personalised Christmas gifts for kids, remember that chocolate is gone by Boxing Day. A keyring with their initials lasts rather longer. Something to eat now and something to keep is a good pairing for godchildren and nieces.
Add a note. A line in your own handwriting does more than a bigger box. Thank the teacher for something specific, and let the children sign it themselves.
Gift 01 · High-end
Al Nassma: camel milk chocolate
Al Nassma is a Dubai producer of camel milk chocolate, and its pieces are about as local as a box of chocolates gets. The Hollow Camel Figurine Gift Box holds a hollow camel made entirely of camel milk chocolate. The 9 Pieces Camel Milk Chocolate Caravan Gift Box is a row of camel-shaped pralines in camel milk chocolate, filled with macadamia nut and honey.
Either suits visiting family who want to take something from Dubai home with them, or a colleague who has everything else. The pralines contain nuts, and both may contain traces of them, so check before giving to children. The site works mostly as a catalogue, so look at how to buy before you plan around it.
Gift 02 · High-end
Forrey & Galland: a Dubai chocolate bar and filled dates
Forrey & Galland began as a Parisian chocolatier more than a century ago and was reinvented in Dubai by Isabelle Jaouen and Vincent Moret: a French chocolate house with a Dubai atelier. Its Dubai Chocolate Pistachio Kunafa Tablet is a thick milk chocolate shell around pistachio cream and kunafa toasted in butter.
That makes it a natural Dubai chocolate Christmas gift for anyone abroad who has heard of the bar and never tried one made here. For a more classic box, The Classic Dates Edition, 16 pieces is an assortment of filled Medjool dates, with almond, pistachio, rose, sesame halwa and orange blossom, plus dates in dark or milk chocolate. It suits grandparents and hosts.
Gift 03 · High-end
Coco Jalila: small boxes from an Emirati chocolatier
Coco Jalila describes itself as proudly Emirati, founded in the UAE, and makes chocolates alongside Middle Eastern sweets. The Coco Bloom Box with 9 Assorted Daily Doses holds nine chocolates from its Daily Doses line, a size that works as a thank-you without overdoing it.
For someone closer, The Signature Coco Luxe Gift Box is the larger signature box, and the shop asks for a day’s notice on it. Neither is a Christmas design, which suits a teacher or colleague who may not celebrate it themselves: the gift says thank you without asking them to join in. The product pages list little about flavours, so ask the shop if you need to avoid nuts.
Gift 04 · High-end
Le Chocolatier Dubai: an advent box with a family name
Le Chocolatier Dubai makes its chocolates fresh in Dubai from Belgian chocolate, and personalises boxes with names, ribbons and themes. The Christmas advent calendar premium chocolate box is a red box of about twenty-five assorted, eggless chocolates that can carry a family name or a Christmas greeting. If a countdown is part of your December, our Christmas countdown ideas suggest how to use one without it taking over.
For a host or a grandparent, the Christmas season deer decorated premium chocolate wooden hamper is a small red and green wooden hamper of wrapped chocolates with a deer decoration, and it can carry a short message too. Both may contain nuts.
Gift 05 · Small, home-grown
The Date Room: Al Ain dates from an Emirati family
The Date Room belongs to the Al Dhaheri family, who have farmed date palms across Al Ain for generations and began sharing them with the world in 2018. The Al Reha Gift Box Collection comes with plain, stuffed or chocolate-dipped dates, in a textured brown and gold box inspired by the reha, the traditional stone mill. There are two sizes.
Dates are the local alternative to chocolate, and the plain and stuffed boxes cope with a warm afternoon far better than chocolate does. They suit a neighbour, a teacher or anyone who prefers something less sweet, and they make sense on almost any table in the UAE, whatever the occasion.
Gift 06 · Small, home-grown
Co Chocolat: festive boxes from a Dubai chocolate factory
Co Chocolat runs a chocolate café and factory in Dubai, and its winter boxes are small enough for a class list. The Little Festive Treat is a wooden box with a gianduja hazelnut, a pyramid box of two truffles, a hot chocolate lolly, dark milk chocolate with roasted hazelnuts and peanuts, and a Christmas candy mint.
The Winter Mini Art Deco Box holds six pieces in one of four assortments, including vegan, gluten-free Conscious Truffles and cookie truffles with local flavours such as Aseeda, with butternut and cardamom, and Rahash, with tahini and spiced speculoos. It suits a teacher who likes something unusual. Many pieces contain nuts.
Gift 07 · Small, home-grown
Chocobrosia: handmade Christmas bonbons
Chocobrosia is a small-batch chocolatier handcrafting its chocolates in Dubai, with a Christmas shop of small boxes. The Classic Christmas Gift Box, 9 Chocolates holds nine handmade bonbons made with couverture chocolate, freshly roasted nuts and spices ground in-house, and comes with a carry bag, ribbon and tag. The assortment may vary.
For a slightly bigger thank-you, the Christmas Treat Box is a small hamper with a chocolate bar, a panettone, a fruit preserve and a glass jar of caramelised cashews. The brand says its chocolates are made without eggs, alcohol or palm oil, which helps when you are buying for a mixed group.
Gift 08 · Small, home-grown
The House of Cakes Dubai: a box of decorated Christmas biscuits
The House of Cakes Dubai was founded in 2006 by Irena and Kaloyan Dimitrovi, and says it was the first bakery in the UAE to offer bespoke cake designs. Its Gift box of Christmas Cookies is a set of six decorated biscuits, such as snowflakes and gingerbread men, in sugar or chocolate sugar dough.
Six biscuits in a box is a tidy teacher gift, and children can help choose. The order form has room for an inscription and a gift card message, so ask the bakery how a name works on biscuits. The listing may be from an earlier season, so check the Christmas menu when you order. The bakery’s DIY decorating box appears in our Christmas Eve box ideas.
Gift 09 · Small, home-grown
Joyful Treats: cookie boxes and a gingerbread house cake
Joyful Treats grew from Tasneem’s home kitchen into a Dubai bakery, and it calls itself proudly rooted in Dubai. The Assorted Cookie Box comes as a box of three or six, baked fresh with crisp edges, soft centres and Belgian chocolate. It contains gluten, eggs and dairy.
If you are hosting rather than giving, the Bespoke Gingerbread house cake is a cake made to look like a gingerbread cottage, iced and decorated with sweets, in a choice of flavours and sizes for a big table. It is not a small gift, but it makes a good centrepiece for the family lunch. Bespoke cakes need notice, so ask early.
Gift 10 · Small, home-grown
Embossed: a leather keyring with initials
Embossed is a Dubai personalisation studio for leather goods, and its tagline is “Personalised in Dubai.” The Personalised Round Keyring (Beige) is a round piece of pebbled saffiano leather with initials on it, and the Personalised Round Keyring (Pink) is the same in pink.
It is the one gift on this list that will still be around in March. It suits older children and teenagers for a school bag, a teacher’s keys or a godparent who already has enough chocolate. Pair it with a small box from one of the chocolatiers above and you have something to eat and something to keep. Check the initials twice before you order.
The small gift that lasts
The chocolates will be eaten by New Year. A photograph of the family stays on the fridge, the desk or the grandparents’ sideboard for years. If you are looking for one more small gift, a print from a Christmas session is easy to post abroad and does not melt. The Christmas Edit is thirty minutes for up to four people, in two of our three setups. The Christmas Kitchen is messy, playful and real, with real flour, and makes the kind of picture a grandparent frames. You can book your session online.
Let’s sum up
For small Christmas gifts, choose one or two Dubai makers and order early: camel milk chocolate or a Dubai chocolate bar for visitors, a small Emirati box or Al Ain dates for teachers and neighbours, decorated biscuits for the class, and a leather keyring for anyone who would rather keep something. Check the allergens, keep chocolate out of the car, and add a note in your own handwriting.
Questions about Christmas chocolates in Dubai
Dubai chocolate usually means a thick chocolate bar filled with pistachio cream and crisp toasted kunafa pastry. Forrey & Galland makes a version in its Dubai atelier with a milk chocolate shell. It is a popular gift for friends and family abroad, so keep it cool on the journey and give it soon after.
Several Dubai makers sell them online. Le Chocolatier Dubai lists Christmas advent boxes and hampers, Chocobrosia has a Christmas shop of small boxes, and Co Chocolat lists winter boxes. For something local, Al Nassma makes camel milk chocolate. Seasonal ranges change, so check the product pages before you order.
A chocolate box with their name on it, a box of decorated biscuits with an inscription or, for older children, a leather keyring with their initials. Spell the name carefully and order early, because personalised pieces are made to order and small makers are busy before Christmas.
They can. December afternoons are mild, but a parked car or a school bag in the sun warms up quickly. Keep chocolates indoors, hand them over the same day and give them to an adult rather than leaving them in a bag. Dates and biscuits are more forgiving.
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The Setup Collective builds three Christmas rooms in Dubai each season, the Christmas Room, the Christmas Kitchen and Christmas Morning, then photographs families in them. Candidly: nobody gets told to tuck their chin in. Who we are
