Miku Restaurant
1055 West Hastings Street,
Vancouver, BC.
Ph: (604) -568-3900 or Reserve Online
After enjoying an excellent lunch at Minami, the sister restaurant to Miku that recently opened in Yaletown, I arranged to meet a friend at Miku for a sort of follow up lunch. The aburi style of saba and salmon that I enjoyed so much at Minami was introduced first at Miku. My friend was late so I enjoyed a glass of Three Blancs wine while I waited. Although the menu only listed it as from Okanagan Falls, I believe it is the blend of Pinot Blanc, Gewürtztraminer and Muscat from the Tangled Vines Estate Winery, one I have yet to visit. Anyway the wine was a perfect summer sipper, light and fruity, just to my taste.
We were strolling down Mainland Street on our way back from the Vancouver Public Library and on impulse, decided to drop in to Minami Restaurant for lunch. It opened in June in the space that was previously occupied by Goldfish Restaurant, where I had enjoyed some great meals in recent years; (Goldfish Pacific Restaurant and Goldfish Restaurant Reprise). Minami is the new sister restaurant to Miku on West Hastings. I was so impressed with this lunch at Minami, that I plan to visit Miku for lunch next week.
Glancing over the menu we noted the aburi sushi. Aburi refers to the lightly seared / partly raw fish topping on the sushi rice. This is a specialty of the restaurant. We decided to try the Aburi Salmon Oshi Sushi and Aburi Saba Oshi Sushi.
The first is pressed local salmon with jalapeno pepper and miku sauce. The second is house cured mackerel served with miku miso sauce. The picture top-right on this page is a close up on the two types. Both were tender and bursting with flavour. We both loved each type but my favorite was the Saba. Exactly what miku sauce is I don't know. Perhaps I will find out when I go there for lunch.
It had been months that I and a friend had been trying to get to an underground dining dinner at NFA with Steve (of steve@dineinvancouver.ca) but my travel schedule and Steve's seating availability didn't mesh. So when he let me know he had one last space open for a Friday night I decided to accept and despite some minor trepidation, just go on my own.
As it turned out I was glad that I took this opportunity. The other guests that were there that evening were congenial and fun and I had a great time. Two of the groups had come because one or two of their members had previously enjoyed a meal with NFA. One couple and myself were newbies. Everybody there was a "foodie" to some degree, and there were lots of recommendations for good dining flying around the table.
Rangoli
1488 West 11th Avenue,
Vancouver
Ph: (604) 736-5711
With an out-of-town visitor who loves Indian cuisine and with tickets to see High Society at the Stanley Theatre, my obvious choice of restaurant was Vijs. But they don't take reservations and there was no way we could get there early enough to get a table, so instead we dropped in next door to Rangoli, the baby sibling restaurant that also sells packaged and refrigerated ready-to-eat Indian food, from recipes initially developed in Vijs kitchen.
We decided to share an appetizer, a curry and a vegetarian dish to get an overall perspective on the food. Our appetizer choice was the cauliflower, spinach,onion and potato pakoras with daal. Spicy but not excessively so - I enjoyed them.
Hawksworth Restaurant
801 West Georgia St.,
Vancouver, BC
Ph: (604) 673 - 7000 or Reserve Online
Before going to see La Cage aux Folles at the Vancouver Playhouse, I was invited to dinner at Hawksworth. Although it had been on my "must visit" list for a while, this was my first opportunity to dine here and I was looking forward to it.
We both decided on appetizers and an entree, self-righteously planning on not having dessert. Although that plan did not last much past our first look at the dessert menu.
Sage Bistro at UBC
6331 Crescent Road,Vancouver.
Ph: 604 822-0968
It has been ages, probably several years, since I had lunch at Sage Bistro. Before I chose to redeploy myself from university professor to on-line media professional, Sage Bistro was the place of choice for on-campus lunch meetings.
I was delighted to be invited to join a friend for lunch at Sage prior to attending a talk and curious to see whether the food was as good as I remembered. Luckily it was.
For starters my friend chose the salad of UBC mixed greens with white balsamic vinaigrette from their Fall menu. Our server recounted the specials for the day, among which was a tuna tartare with sweet and sour gelée with coriander and sesame oil.
Happy hour oysters? When a fellow oyster-loving friend invited us to join her for the happy hour oyster special at Cork and Fin in Gastown, how could we resist? Three of us enjoyed a brisk walk across town and arrived at the restaurant at six, still in time for happy hour (5:30 to 6:30).
I met a foodie friend for supper at Cibo before going to see the wonderful Tosca Cafe at the Vancouver Playhouse. The food was really great but the lighting was poor and unfortunately my food photos don't reflect how good the food was.
The first hint of the food quality was that the in-house baked focaccia was so perfect that we ate all four pieces of it within minutes of taking the first bite. And this was despite my resolution not to have bread because we had ordered two of the bruschetta selections and I thought that would be more than enough bread for one meal.
La Buca
4025 MacDonald Street
Vancouver
Ph: (604) 730.6988
La Buca is a little gem of a Italian restaurant in the neighborhood of Arbutus Ridge. Although I have been a fan of Andrey Durbach's food since way back when he had Etoile on Hornby Street, I somehow had not yet got to La Buca for dinner. Tasting some of the delicious hors d'oeuvres that he prepared for a Blackbird Theatre fundraiser earlier in the summer reminded me of this and so prior to seeing a show out at the Frederick Wood theatre at UBC, I made a reservation for an early dinner.
Miku Restaurant
Minami Restaurant
We were strolling down Mainland Street on our way back from the Vancouver Public Library and on impulse, decided to drop in to Minami Restaurant for lunch. It opened in June in the space that was previously occupied by Goldfish Restaurant, where I had enjoyed some great meals in recent years; (
Glancing over the menu we noted the aburi sushi. Aburi refers to the lightly seared / partly raw fish topping on the sushi rice. This is a specialty of the restaurant. We decided to try the Aburi Salmon Oshi Sushi and Aburi Saba Oshi Sushi.
It had been months that I and a friend had been trying to get to an underground dining dinner at NFA with Steve (of 
As it turned out I was glad that I took this opportunity. The other guests that were there that evening were congenial and fun and I had a great time. Two of the groups had come because one or two of their members had previously enjoyed a meal with NFA. One couple and myself were newbies. Everybody there was a "foodie" to some degree, and there were lots of recommendations for good dining flying around the table. 
Rangoli
With an out-of-town visitor who loves Indian cuisine and with tickets to see 
Caché Bistro and Lounge
I have dined twice at Caché in the past couple of months month and both times enjoyed both the excellent food and the good service.
Hawksworth Restaurant
Before going to see La Cage aux Folles at the Vancouver Playhouse, I was invited to dinner at Hawksworth. Although it had been on my "must visit" list for a while, this was my first opportunity to dine here and I was looking forward to it.
Sage Bistro at UBC
I was delighted to be invited to join a friend for lunch at Sage prior to attending a talk and curious to see whether the food was as good as I remembered. Luckily it was. 
Cork and Fin
Happy hour oysters? When a fellow oyster-loving friend invited us to join her for the happy hour oyster special at Cork and Fin in Gastown, how could we resist? Three of us enjoyed a brisk walk across town and arrived at the restaurant at six, still in time for happy hour (5:30 to 6:30).
The first hint of the food quality was that the in-house baked focaccia was so perfect that we ate all four pieces of it within minutes of taking the first bite. And this was despite my resolution not to have bread because we had ordered two of the bruschetta selections and I thought that would be more than enough bread for one meal.
La Buca
La Buca is a little gem of a Italian restaurant in the neighborhood of Arbutus Ridge. Although I have been a fan of Andrey Durbach's food since way back when he had Etoile on Hornby Street, I somehow had not yet got to La Buca for dinner. Tasting some of the delicious hors d'oeuvres that he prepared for a 
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