Last Call at BOCA

After 12 years, BOCA pops its last cork next week. Three Friends of BOCA reflect on its legacy and their fondest moments.

This may age some of us but, Cheers – a sitcom about close-knit regulars who found belonging in a bar by the same name – distilled its premise inside its theme tune: “Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name”.

BOCA was that place for many. Office workers spilled out to wind down after hours. Chancers stopped for a fast drink before slipping into the night.

A place for wine aficionados coveting a cellar seat during The Tasting Class or Breakfast Wine Club sessions. BOCA’s tall doors and outside terrace were a sanctuary for those angling for one last nightcap.

A place where strangers became friends, and friends became regulars.

And like that final scene in Cheers, before the lights dimmed for one last time, these three Friends of BOCA come together to reminisce about a place that brought them and others together in honour of Omar Shihab, Patricia Roig, Shiv Menon, as well as Matthijs Stinnissen and Ricardo Valentine.

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Courtney says…

From my first visit in Spring 2016 (or whenever Chef Matt first arrived in the kitchen – I believe our visit was simultaneous), BOCA was never just about food; it was about being a place where I felt connected, a place I kept returning to not because I had to, but because the restaurant became part of my life.

BOCA was never about spectacle. It was about long lunches that stretched into early evenings or dinners that stretched into the wee hours, where one more glass of something crisp felt less like indulgence and more like inevitability. More than that, I remember how BOCA always made space for real conversation with industry friends and others, a restaurant where no one checked their phone.

I fondly remember dishes that didn’t shout for attention but instead, invited lingering. How crusty bread (hot from the oven) and the best wine (that I had never heard of, but always loved) were always waiting. More than that, I remember how BOCA made space for real conversation, where no one checks their phone because they want to stay in the moment.

BOCA was a place for catching up. Meetings that started as “just a quick one” and ended three hours later with dessert you didn’t plan on ordering. It was always a place where you never knew who was going to walk in the door, but it was forever a friend you hadn’t seen in a while, the perfect person to network with, or someone you had always wanted to meet. You never had to check ahead for the guest list for dinners or events, because it was always immaculate – full of the best in the industry that no PR could ever curate.

In a city that changes as quickly as Dubai does, consistency is its own kind of luxury. BOCA managed that not by staying the same, but by holding on to its center and evolving through sustainability in a city where it seemed impossible. Well-deserved awards came, and these accolades always generated the loudest cheers in the room.

BOCA evolved, sure, but never in a way that made you feel like you had missed something. If anything, it felt like it was growing alongside you. And maybe that’s why the memories linger. Not because any single moment was extraordinary, but because, together, they create a comforting sense of continuity that feels timeless.

BOCA wasn’t just somewhere you dined. It was somewhere you kept coming back to, until one day you realized it had been there all along, marking the moments that mattered without ever needing to say so.

While I look forward to whatever the next (successful) iteration will be, BOCA gave the blueprint for what independent dining could be in Dubai and across the GCC. The best nights were always pop-ups, visiting chefs, wine nights, or something that corporates and chains wouldn’t be able to touch.

You can find Courtney Brandt on Substack, where she publishes the Weekly A to Z and restaurant reviews for paid subscribers, or find Courtney on Instagram.

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Pallavi says…

The first time I went to BOCA was on the eve of my birthday in 2018.

Eight years later, it is not one visit I remember, but the many that followed. The ones that blur into each other in the best way. Nights that started with a plan and quickly moved beyond it. One glass becoming a bottle, then another, not out of excess but because no one was ready to leave.

BOCA was always about bringing people together.

It was where you showed up for dinner and stayed for the room. Where tables extended, conversations overlapped, and introductions happened without effort.

And then there were the nights that defined it. Wine takeovers, collab dinners, champagne flowing a little more freely than usual. The kind of evenings that felt like something was happening, but without ever feeling staged. You were part of it just by being there.

The wine sat at the centre of it all. Always interesting, never intimidating. You trusted what was being poured, even if you had never heard of it before. It became part of the ritual. Discovering something new, sharing it across the table, going back for another.

Somewhere in all of this, BOCA also held its ground on sustainability. Not as a headline, but as something embedded into how it operated, shaping what ended up on your table and in your glass.

And yes, the cellar would probably make a very good bunker. Not entirely in jest. But BOCA was never about retreat. It was about gathering. About good wine, good people, and the kind of nights you wish you had more of.

That is what I will remember most.

You can find Pallavi Sangtani on Substack or Instagram.

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Liam says…

BOCA was a place where time disappeared. Where evening became night (and, often, the early hours). The luckiest of us – after a liver-threatening pours of Shiv’s joie du jour – tipped our heads back in riotous laughter.

The world stood still in that cellar, incubated, warmed with joy of human connection.

BOCA was never about finery, but it wielded fun between its fingers. To adapt a phrase, it stole lightning from the gods, and bottled it.

I could tell you about the team’s generosity during my WSET II studies. Or the late afternoon my wife, moved to tears, on the fortieth birthday she had no intention of marking.

I should also tell you how Omar championed female talent, both local and abroad, during 7 Chefs in 7 Weeks, the Mixologist Series and more.

If you asked whether I went to BOCA, my fondest memories would surface. But if you asked me what BOCA meant, I would tell you something else.

I am at a stage of my legal career where one starts to consider legacy — what is left behind, and what endures.

I credit BOCA and, specifically Omar Shihab, with driving a prescient conversation about sustainability in UAE’s hospitality industry, a market better known for importing luxury than interrogating it.

Omar, through BOCA, articulated metrics and standards, shared the blueprint selflessly, held BOCA accountable and toiled to find solutions: solar energy sourcing, championing local produce, rethinking uniforms, building a sustainable wine menu, normalising filtered table water, and much, much more.

The Michelin Green Star came; so did Star Wine List awards and, finally, Omar was recognised with the Icon Award by his peers in the 2025 MENA 50 Best Restaurants list.

Not everything was a raging success. Two steps forward, one step back. But they marched on. Others took notice. Some followed.

Many great restaurants are closing right now. Time is a fickle mistress. We may not remember who started something, or when, but their ideas and fingerprints indelibly remain.

I see the seeds BOCA sowed taking root across Dubai.

I am proud to have seen it up close. Congratulations Omar, Shiv and Patricia. I hope we get to do it again.

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You can find Liam Collens on Substack, Instagram, and Threads, where he writes as a restaurant critic and food and travel writer based in the Middle East. He co-authored The Rise of Indian Food: Recipes Reimagined by Trésind Studio, out 6 May from Phaidon Press. He owns EatGoSee and contributes to other publications.