Dubai Hills could easily pass for a suburb of St Petersburg these days. Drive through and you’ll find Russian cafés, Slavic bakeries and restaurants that wouldn’t look out of place on Nevsky Prospect. My neighbours in Dubai Harbour are Russian, the café on the ground floor of my building is run by Russians and the menu is unapologetically Slavic. Borscht, draniki and beef stroganoff are no longer niche comfort foods for expats – they’re edging into the city’s mainstream dining mix.

This is what happens when geopolitics reshapes migration patterns. Since the war in Ukraine began, circumstances including sanctions have forced many Russians to choose Dubai as their new base. More than two million Russians and Eastern Europeans visited the UAE in 2023, about 13 per cent of the Emirates’ total tourists. By early last year, some 700,000 Russians had secured UAE residency. That influx is remaking neighbourhoods, property markets and, increasingly, the restaurant scene.

A few years ago, Russian restaurants were a curio. Now, press releases for Slavic concepts hit my inbox most weeks. At Gulfood, the world’s largest F&B sourcing event, nearly 100 Russian food companies exhibited across a sprawling pavilion in Dubai this year. The emirate is clearly where Russian culinary entrepreneurs see opportunity and where they’re innovating.

Restaurant consultant Alexander Syrnev has had a front-row seat to this evolution. He brought Babushka and Novikov, two successful Slavic concepts, to the city. “When we opened Babushka, it was right as the political situation started,” he told me. “For us, it was a big challenge – people thought that Russian cuisine was just borscht and caviar. We wanted to show that it is heartfelt food that anyone can enjoy.” His restaurants doubled as cultural bridges: a touch of nostalgia for the Russian-speaking crowd but also an introduction for those curious about Slavic flavours.

Russian chefs marvel at how quickly they can source produce here. What has become expensive or scarce in Moscow can be bought in Dubai in a matter of hours. Syrnev recalls a chef telling him, “Dubai is the best city in the world for sourcing. Any seafood, any spice, anything a chef wants, it’s here.” The city’s supply chain, paired with its open wallets, makes it fertile ground for culinary experimentation.

What’s most striking, however, is that even as the war in Ukraine continues, Dubai’s dining rooms don’t mirror the divides of geopolitics elsewhere. I’ve seen Ukrainians happily seated in Russian restaurants, chatting with Belarusian hostesses and Kazakh waiters. The Slavic staff who front these establishments, whether Russian, Ukrainian or otherwise, often work side by side with little friction. It’s a reminder that the UAE operates on a different wavelength: people are welcomed on the strength of their bank balance, their investment and their ability to buy property or open a business. Politics is replaced with transaction. 

That doesn’t mean those moving here are devoid of political leanings – far from it. Many bring strong opinions with them, forged by events back home. But Dubai’s promise is precisely that those opinions can be parked at the door. For Russians, Ukrainians and everyone else, the city offers a space where business, hospitality and pragmatism matter more than ideology. Whatever your political leanings, Dubai is a place where people often come to escape politics itself – just as much as conflict and sanction. 

But what isn’t as easy is Dubai’s unforgiving restaurant market. More than half of all new concepts fail and Russian restaurateurs are not immune. “Some come here thinking they’re kings and queens,” says Syrnev. “But Dubai slaps them hard. Rents are high, staffing is tough, competition is fierce.” The winners are those who adapt – who tweak menus, appeal to Dubai’s diverse clientele and meet the city’s exacting standards.

Yet the trend is undeniable. You can now order pelmeni on delivery apps, find blini in mall cafés and sit down to a Slavic fine-dining experience that rivals anything in Europe. Dubai has become a laboratory for Russian culinary soft power.

From my vantage point, living in a building where Cyrillic menus greet me downstairs, it feels like something bigger. Dubai has always been a city of hybrids; Lebanese food adapted to Gulf palates, reinvented Japanese cuisine. Russian meals seem next in line. And if history is any guide, once a cuisine takes root here, it rarely stays confined to an expat bubble.

Inzamam Rashid is Monocle’s Gulf correspondent.

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