But, I have been eating! Here’s a drive-by review of some memorable ones…

Downtown: Thierry Patisserie – I have been a regular at this lovely French cafe since they opened a few months back. Good coffee but the pastries, desserts, and macarons are what this place is all about. My faves: The apple turnover, layers of flaky delicate crust filled with tart and sweet apples – perfect. The blackberry macaron, with a actual blackberry in the middle it’s the perfect texture and flavour contrast in these cookies that are beautiful, but quite sweet. For chocolate lovers, the chocolate succé cake is dense, rich, and full of chocolate. I only needed 1 bite, but it was a good bite. Prices are a more than your average cafe, but worth it in most cases. However, I cannot grasp how 100g of candied maple pecans can cost $14.95. Or how a small tub of ice cream can cost $14.95. But then six lemon madelines for $6 is pretty good! Make sure you look at the price for no surprises.

Downtown: Bel Cafe – When David Hawksworth opens a cafe, you run to it! I did. Although, I walked into the cafe distracted and manged to look like a complete ditz right in front of David Hawksworth – not one of my better moments. However, is the food good. A crispy ham and cheese sandwich like no other and a smooth roasted tomato soup made a memorable lunch. And the macarons, despite being everywhere now, are quite tasty. The outside macron layer just shatters when you take a bite and the flavours (ie. black sesame seed and yuzu, raspberry and rosewater) are interesting and delicious. Again, expect to pay restaurant prices at the cafe, but the food you get is worthy.

Downtown: Hawksworth Restaurant, visit #2 – I was at Hawksworth for a second visit this week and it was a great dinner. Service was much improved from my first visit as well. I just LOVED my salad – pear, speck, burrata, and greens, which came beautifully plated on a wooden board. Amazing combination.

Downtown: My daily lunch spot is now Italian Kitchen 2 Go. A tasty sandwich with a fresh salad for $6.50? Best deal anywhere. They also have great pastas, and pizza. The line-ups are long, but the staff is fast and efficient.

Downtown: RIP amazing chorizo sandwich from La Brasserie Street – You know, I enjoy the now famous La Brasserie Chicken Sandwich, but I just LOVED their new sandwich of chorizo, arugula, roasted red peppers, and spicy tomato sauce. It was so delicious, saucy, and included vegetables! I just can’t bring myself to have a vegetable free lunch on most days. Sadly, so many people demanded the chicken sandwich that this amazing chorizo never stood a chance. They phased out the chorizo for chicken after a couple weeks. *sigh*

Kitsilano/Point Grey: La Ghianda – Keeping to the trend of “great restaurant opens a cafe,” La Ghianda is also a good one. From the owners of the excellent La Quercia is La Ghianda, an excellent Italian style deli and cafe. Go there for the huge Italian sandwiches (mortadella, mmmm), or made to order pastas.

South Granville: Go Fish 2.0 – Part of my summer is at least 1 long line-up and feast at the Go Fish shack by Granville Island. But a second Go Fish location is now open! This version is Go Fish restaurant style, in the former Bin 942 location on Broadway near Granville. I attended a menu tasting while back and it was excellent. My best memory was really the passion I saw in the chefs creating the food. They spoke about all the menu items with such zest and enjoyment – love that! The menu is different from the fish shack location. The fish and chips are still there, but the tacones are not. There are appetizers, mains, and desserts. I loved the “chips and dip” – a great little snack. Lots of Latin-influenced flavours on the menu. Definitely worth a visit.

Main St: Bob like Thai Food – Someone at work tipped me off on this place, telling me it was the most authentic Thai food they’d eaten since being in Thailand. With an endorsement like that, I ordered takeout from them that night. And I’ve ordered it again and again since. A menu with the usual items plus lots of interesting and authentic dishes you don’t see at other Thai restaurants. The pad thai is awesome. It’s different from the amazing Maenam pad thai, but just as good. With lunch specials for $7.50, it’s an affordable, yummy option. My friend just raves about the mango sticky rice, too.  The restaurant itself is super casual (but cold!).

Happy eating.

Hawksworth is a fresh addition to the Vancouver dining scene, featuring a gorgeous room, beautiful food, plus an even more stunning clientele. This is the restaurant where you put on that killer dress you’ve been saving up and work it.

First, the good:
- I love the room. It’s contemporary with a huge glam factor and overlooks the Vancouver Art Gallery, one of the city’s most beautiful buildings.
- The beautiful restaurant and bar are just asking for you to dress up. The people watching here is excellent.
- A great cocktail list – Plan for a before dinner drink at the bar and watch the bartenders craft some beautiful drinks. I am not drinking alcohol at the moment, and they had several “zero proof” cocktails for me too.
- Playful plates. For every dish we ordered, the plates came out colourful, composed, and playful. I truly enjoyed the plating for all dishes. You eat with your eyes first, after all.
- From the bar menu:  thick cut, triple fried  frites, soft and tender inside with a crispy exterior.
- The Foie Gras Parfait – a delicious, must-have appetizer. Great texture, flavour, and the best part – it comes with foie gras cotton candy!
- Yellowfin tuna carpaccio – fresh, generous slices of yellowfin with a perfectly balanced sauce and crispy puffed rice
-Seared scallops with a housemade xo sauce – perfectly cooked with sweet, salty, spicy flavours
- Tender, tender pork loin cooked sous vide with spatzle
- Flaky and moist olive oil poached salmon with mild Indian flavours and an eggplant caviar tinted black with squid ink
- And I didn’t order this, but I sure wish I did – a 22oz rib eye to share. Every order that came out of the kitchen looked so good and tender.
- The restaurant also offers a great bar menu and brunch/lunch menus, so there’s something for all occasions.

However.

My first Hawksworth experience was not perfect, so I need to detail my issues. But, I am giving them some benefit of the doubt as they are newly opened and I was there at 8pm on a Saturday night – the place was packed.

The drawbacks:
- I was really disappointed with the service. Our waiter was nice, but clearly too busy and there was no personalized service at all. For a restaurant of this caliber, that is unacceptable. It took 20 minutes for our drinks to be served after we were seated, and another 20 minutes before they returned to take our order. Coffees arrived after our desserts were served. A friend ordered a cocktail that she did not like and it sat at our table throughout the entire dinner, full. When the mains were cleared the waiter picked it up, asked if she was done with it and walked off. What?!! My friend said not to say anything, or I would have.

- Dessert was a miss. Most people at our table had the milk chocolate mousse with passion fruit. Sounds delicious, but the milk chocolate was way too subtle for the tart passion fruit, which overwhelmed it. Pretty plate, but unbalanced flavour. I’ll order a different dessert next time.

- And my nit-pick issue. There is carpet in the centre of the dining room, where we were seated. It’s a nice carpet, but there’s one problem. The chairs don’t slide gracefully on the carpet. Getting in/out of the chair turned into a slightly awkward occasion.

So, let’s return to the good as my overall experience at Hawksworth was wonderful. Great food, glam room, and fun people watching. I can’t think of another restaurant in Vancouver with a combination quite like this. Go, dress-up, and enjoy.

Hawksworth Restaurant
801 West Georgia Street inside the Rosewood Hotel Georgia (@ Howe)
604.673.7000

Blogger’s note: I title this blog “Vancouver Good” because I like to only write about the good things in Vancouver. Overall, I really liked Hawksworth and look forward to many future visits. I had to highlight some drawbacks this time or I would have felt uneasy making the recommendation when I did experience some negatives.

First, I love how the Loden Hotel renovated the restaurant formerly known as Voya into Tableau – an urban, French bistro feel, a la Balthazar in NYC. They’ve also added an outdoor patio for afternoon lunches and drinks.

I’ve only been for lunch, but the food was excellent. A nicely cooked halibut cobb salad with fresh greens and a mild blue cheese. Or the quintessential bistro dish, steak frites – sliced steak drizzled with a red wine sauce. You also get a lovely salad with the dish, which makes having steak and fries for lunch much healthier. Portions are a little small, but you don’t leave the restaurant hungry.

The website also says takeout is coming soon. This excites me – as a new mom, I am eating at home more so having access to quality takeout food will be a treat.

The restaurant was bustling at lunch with a diverse crowd, including lots of business meetings – this is a great expense account restaurant.

The restaurant scene in this part of downtown isn’t great, so it’s nice to see Tableau here. I hope it does well.

Tableau Bar & Bistro
1181 Melville Street (@Bute)
Vancouver
604-639-8692

And Meat & Bread is a lunchtime destination in Gastown these days. The place is packed everyday with a long, but quick-moving line of people ordering some seriously mouth watering sandwiches.

As the name indicates, Meat & Bread is a simple concept – just 4 sandwiches on the menu, all done well plus an always changing soup and salad. When you march into the place you’re greeted with the smell of slowly cooked meat (mmmmmm) and then you see this beautiful juicy porchetta with crispy fatty skin, and you think…I’m ready to eat.

In addition to the porchetta, there are roasted chicken, meatball, and grilled cheese sandwiches, although I’ve never gotten past the porchetta. The soups and salads are all delicous, but really you are there for the sandwich. My only minor quibble is the bread. It’s a good ciabatta, but the sandwich would be even better if it was slightly toasted or warmed.

All sandwiches are $7-8, a steal of a price for what you’re getting.

Hail to the sandwich!

Meat & Bread
370 Cambie Street (@Hastings)
Vancouver
604-566-9003
Open Monday-Saturday, 11am-5pm

Both locations feature charmingly comfortable and rustic surroundings -(think brightly painted wooden tables with mis-matched chic chairs), and the Kitsilano location also offers plenty of specialty food items for sale.

It’s homemade deliciousness – to eat-in or take out.

Coco et Olive Fine Foods
3707 Main Street and 3476 West Broadway
Vancouver

Rotisserie chicken – shredded and tossed in gravy, mounded on a pillowy soft buttermilk bun and topped with crispy fried onions. That’s it. Simple and super yum. The gravy makes the sandwich moist, but not soggy, and the whole sandwich smells and tastes great. Add a dollop of grainy mustard and you’re all set.

In a perfect world they’d have a salad I could have on the side, but I will never so no to such a tasty sandwich. The truck is open until 6pm everyday.Go get one.

Download the street food app to find this and all food trucks in the city.

I tend to go the more traditional route with their properly poached eggs, turkey sausage, toast, and homemade jam. Or, a yummy BLT with a generous serving of bacon on crispy ciabatta bread.

Seb’s provides good quality food & portions at a reasonable price. It is certainly one of the better brunch joints in Vancouver. As a popular neighborhood restaurant, expect to wait in line on the weekend during prime brunch hours. Go early or expect to grab a cup of coffee from the staff and peruse the kitchen gadgets for sale in the entry way while in line.

Seb’s Market Cafe
592 East Broadway( @Carolina)
Vancouver
(604) 298-4403

Can’t say I have ever been to a Franco-German restaurant before this one, but doesn’t the idea sound awesome? Take the best classic French bistro dishes combined with the best German food and you have a menu with steak tartare, mussels & fries, steak frites, homemade bratwurst and saurkraut, and schnitzel. Yum.

My first visit was a Sunday evening for a quick dinner of rotisserie chicken and frites for me, and the homemade bratwurst for the hubby. The chicken was huge – an entire half chicken on the bone, extremely moist and “chickeny.” The frites were super crispy and salty and lovely dunked into the housemade ketchup and mayo. The bratwurst came with sauerkraut and mashed potatoes – also delicious, but the flavours were a bit more muted than expected. When you think bratwurst and sauerkraut you think really punchy flavours, but it was much milder here. Perhaps to cater to the masses.

Overall, it was a great first visit and I’m looking forward to trying another dinner and the weekend brunch menu next time I want some gourmet comfort food.

La Brasserie
1091 Davie Street
604.568.6499
No reservations

The menu is simple but interesting. One soup prepared daily, five salads (all vegetarian), five sandwiches, a daily quiche, a cheese plate, and a charcuterie plate.

I enjoyed Mike’s Reuben sandwich with a beets & cheese salad. The sandwich was rich from the excellent corned beef*, a smattering of sauerkraut, thousand island dressing, and melted swiss cheese on rye. On the side, my marinated beets with frisee and goats cheese was a light, fresh accompaniment.

My dining partner went for the meat ball sub, featuring the now famous meatballs from sister restaurant Judas Goat. The meatballs were rolled in a tomato sauce, tucked into a soft bun, and topped with shavings of ricotta salata cheese. Delicious & moist with a salty bite. On the side was the Mediterranean macaroni salad, tossed in a tomato dressing with arugula, olives, and feta.

Dishes I have my eye on for the next visit: Good ‘ol potato salad, a TLT (T=smoked trout), and the grilled cheese with smoked jarlsberg, brie, and caramelized onions.

Sandwiches range from $8-9 dollars, and you can add a salad or soup for $3 more. Great value for what you’re getting. The restaurant is also open for breakfast, serving coffee & baked goodies.

Weekday lunches are looking up!

Everything Cafe
75 East Pender Street, b/w Carrall & Columbia
Vancouver
604-681-3115

* The supplier of corned beef is Mike Vito, of J. Beethoven’s corned beef fame. If you ever see them at Granville Island, do yourself a favour and buy some for dinner at home one night. INCREDIBLE!

I don’t know about other Vancouver food lovers, but I find this question impossible to answer. There is no way, NO WAY I could name one restaurant as my favourite. Vancouver has so many good places, it’s a lucky place to be.

However, year after year, Cru Restaurant remains one of my favourites, delivering on all fronts: food, wine, service, and price. You can drop a good sum of money here, but you can also have a great time for about $60.

Sandwiched between unlikely restaurant neighbours Vera’s Burger Shack and Memphis Blues BBQ (although Cru was there first!), Cru is an elegant small restaurant that seats about 40 people. As a diner, you can choose between a daily prix fixe menu for $38 or sample a selection of dishes from their small plates menu. I typically go for the small plates, which let you try a few different flavours and the selection is so great, there’s something for everyone. The menu changes up, but there are always some dishes that stay. Some of my all-time favourites:

• The Cellar Door Caesar: This still remains my favourite caesar in town. It’s probably the most fattening too, but it’s worth it. Crisp romaine lightly grilled with a mound of asiago cheese and thick creamy dressing on top. Then, a few made-to-order buttery croutons on the side. So good.
• Syrah-braised beef short rib with a teeny, but potent pot of macaroni and cheese. The short rib is a tender delicious bite and the rich macaroni and cheese puts it over the top. Like the Caesar, I don’t think Cru can ever take this dish off the menu.
• Sweet spring pea risotto: There’s usually a seasonal risotto on the menu, but my favourite is the Spring version, usually full of beautiful green vegetables and a tender & creamy rice
• Cru Brushchetta: Soft bread, flavourful tomatoes, a good bite
• Classic Creme Brulee – I just love Cru’s version. Smooth and creamy texture, perfectly browned sugar top. Just a well executed, simple dessert.

I could go on, but I’ve never had a bad dish at Cru, so I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. Service is always friendly, attentive, and knowledgeable – the servers are always more than willing to talk food and wine. In fact, I believe a server at Cru was the one who convinced me I had to go to the French Laundry when I was in Napa Valley a few years ago. One of the most memorable (and expensive) meals of my life.

I’m always thankful for Cru. Good food, room, service. A relaxing and delicious place to go.

Cru Restaurant
1459 W. Broadway (@ Granville), Vancouver
604-677-4111