After moderating a discussion on local roots and global tastes at the Hospitality Leaders Summit in Riyadh, Barbara Kardos reflects on what makes a dining culture distinctive – and why protecting Saudi culinary heritage shouldn’t mean preventing it from evolving.

A few days after the Hospitality Leaders Summit in Riyadh, one question is still sitting with me: As Saudi Arabia’s F&B market grows, what exactly are we growing into?

My colleague Stefan Breg has shared his thoughts on the extraordinary scale of that growth, and why the next phase needs to be about creating businesses with genuine staying power. But alongside the question of how much Saudi F&B grows is another important one.

What identity comes out of it?

That was at the heart of the panel I moderated at the Summit: Local Roots, Global Tastes: What Will Define Saudi Arabia’s Dining Identity? Alongside Daniele Chiari, Hakim Bagabas, Majed Almuhanna and Chef Yasser Jad, we explored what happens when a rich culinary heritage meets an increasingly international, adventurous and fast-moving F&B market. And one thing became clear very quickly.

Dining identity is about much more than what’s on the plate.

Of course, traditional dishes matter. Ingredients matter. Cooking techniques matter. But so do regionality, hospitality, ritual, memory and generosity. The way food is shared. The occasions it accompanies. 

The stories behind it and the feelings people associate with it. Those things are much harder to define on a menu, but they’re fundamental to what makes a dining culture feel like it belongs somewhere.

Protect it or evolve it?

This is where things get interesting. There’s a fine balance when we talk about preserving culinary heritage. Treat it too carefully and it risks becoming static. Reinterpret it too aggressively and you risk losing the character that made it meaningful in the first place. Neither feels like the answer.

The opportunity, I think, sits somewhere in between: being confident enough to protect what is distinctive, but open enough to let it evolve. Because culinary cultures have never stood still.

New generations bring different expectations. Travel introduces new ideas. Ingredients and techniques cross borders. Chefs experiment. Diners become more adventurous. Saudi Arabia is experiencing all of those influences at considerable pace. The challenge – and opportunity – is deciding how those influences become part of Saudi dining culture rather than simply sitting on top of it.

Global tastes, Saudi interpretation

There’s no reason an increasingly international F&B market should result in everywhere looking and tasting the same. In fact, I think the opposite is possible. Global inspiration can provide another way to express local identity.

It’s not necessarily about choosing between Saudi tradition and international influence. It’s about taking ideas from elsewhere and interpreting them with enough confidence that the result still feels relevant to the people and place it was created for.

That distinction matters. Because the next phase of Saudi F&B shouldn’t only be about creating more successful restaurants.It should also be about creating a dining culture that becomes increasingly recognisable in its own right.

One that can absorb influences from around the world without becoming interchangeable with anywhere else. One where heritage isn’t something we simply look backwards to protect, but something that can provide inspiration for what comes next. And one that a new generation of Saudi chefs, operators, entrepreneurs and diners can continue to make their own.

Something recognisably Saudi

Saudi Arabia’s F&B growth story is already extraordinary.But scale alone won’t define its dining culture.

That will come from the details. From which traditions are carried forward. Which are reinterpreted. Which new influences take hold. And how all of those things combine to create experiences that feel relevant today while remaining rooted in where they came from.

There isn’t a neat formula for getting that balance right. And perhaps there shouldn’t be. Dining identity isn’t something you decide upon and then preserve unchanged. It develops.

The opportunity now is to give Saudi dining culture the confidence and space to do exactly that. To evolve without losing what makes it distinctive. To welcome the world without replicating it. And ultimately, to create something that people increasingly recognise as unmistakably Saudi. 

The growth story is already extraordinary. The identity that comes out of it may be even more interesting.

A big thank you to Daniele Chiari, Hakim Bagabas, Majed Almuhanna and Chef Yasser Jad for such a thoughtful discussion at the Hospitality Leaders Summit.