Restaurant review: Keep up with the Victorians
Credit to Author: Mia Stainsby| Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2020 19:00:49 +0000
With each visit to Victoria, I’m seduced into moving there. Lots of friends have already succumbed to its allures, and on our last visit in December, even my husband considered it for a nanosecond and thought, hmmm — polite drivers (what a concept!), the human scale, friendly inhabitants, pretty setting, proximity to the ocean, no traffic snarls, and increasingly, an exciting food scene. Why, even the Sussexes seem enthralled.
With each annual visit, there are new restaurants to try, and that wasn’t always the case. Victoria cuisine is a thing now, defined not only by farm-to-table and sea-to-table but by forest-to-table and the notable restaurants ones are as hyper-local as can be.
In such a relaxed setting, a Slow Food culture thrives. Nose-to-tail is a common refrain and butchering is becoming a common kitchen skill, with weekly deliveries of whole pigs.
Trends are influenced by Vancouver Island producers and proximity and relationships with farmers. I visited these restaurants on my last visit, most of them new but Agrius has been open since 2015 and I hadn’t had the opportunity to dine there. The Courtney Room opened in 2018. Now, I feel somewhat caught up, although not totally. Next time!
732 Yates Street
Agrius and the showstopper Fol Epi bakery-deli are separated by a non-existing wall. For my lunch at Agrius the daily house-made charcuterie was head cheese terrine with pickled sea asparagus and onions; I loved it, so much that I later hopped over to Fol Epi and bought a few terrines and a mincemeat pie to take home. A pork schnitzel with sauerkraut, ham hock, rutabaga and honey mustard showed an unmitigated chase for flavours; fried egg sandwich sounds mundane but was quality throughout — the brioche bun, back bacon, cheddar, and tomato jam. There was no dessert on the menu so some canele de Bordeaux sufficed. Owner Cliff Leir stores Red Fife wheat in silos to grind fresh for his lovely breads baked in a wood-fired oven.
An emperor’s feast at Cera Restaurant.
490 Pandora Avenue
This is part of a threesome, (Cera, E:ne Raw Food and Sake Bar and Nubo Japanese Tapas) all with good reputations. I stopped at E:ne for a sake tasting (largest selection of sake in Canada, they say) before going to another restaurant and chatted with a couple at the bar while they worked their way through a very big bowl of ramen — it was so enticing so that was it! Next visit! Meanwhile the newest in the family is Cera in a lovely 1891 heritage building. The cuisine harks back to an 18th Century Korean emperor’s feast, (Hanjeongsik). A bento-like colourful array of food arrives grilled, boiled, steamed, fried, salted with a finisher of rice punch.
Charcuterie at Courtney Room. Picture Leila Kwok.
Magnolia Hotel and Spa
619 Courtney Street
Chefs Chris Klassen (Agrius, Brio, Roux in London) and Brian Tesolin (Langdon Hall, Ontario, Hawksworth, Olo) oversee a bar, brasserie and formal dining area in the renovated boutique Magnolia Hotel. The Courtney Room dining room was one of Canada’s 100 best restaurants last year, and in 2018 was a best new restaurant. We began dinner with a seductive bread basket — loved the spiral filled brioche. For dinner, a satiny tomato coconut veloute; roasted scallops with fermented black beans; Yarrow Meadows duck breast with foraged and pickled mushrooms, sabayon, and duck jus; ling cod and pork belly with XO sauce, crispy rice, and fish sauce vinaigrette — the ingredients were stellar and the chefs keep grounded while experimenting. You can order à la carte or the chef’s menu. There’s a deep wine list, strong on B.C. wines. But don’t miss the great cocktails.
Pork hock at Nowhere restaurant. Mia Stainsby photo.
1001 Douglas Street
It took No. 5 in last year’s Canada’s best new restaurants (Enroute magazine). Run by operators of the meaty, bodacious Hank’s A Restaurant a few steps away, Nowhere is just as unique but more focused on seafood and vegetables. That said, I was thrilled with a decadently delicious roasted pork hock with chimichurri (butchery is big on the menu at both restaurants). The menu goes rogue — halibut cheeks with nduja cream (spicy spreadable pork sausage), risotto with farmhouse cheese broth and charred sauce and pinipig cracker (pounded glutinous rice), all slammed with flavour. When we couldn’t choose a dessert, we were offered a taster of four. The playlist favours Tragically Hip we noticed. (Open Wednesday to Saturday.)
658 Herald Street
I love the old-soul room in this Chinatown spot with soaring ceiling and hints of Indochine. After a bright, fresh tasting brunch here, I’m pumped to go for dinner on my next Victoria crossing. The Egg McDuckin breakfast sandwich (duck bacon, duck confit, pickled fennel orange slaw, thyme orange marmalade mayo), the banana bread French toast with maple bourbon chocolate syrup, the heuvos rancheros (smoked cheddar and cumin scented crème fraîche lifted it out of the ordinary) were all delicious. For dinner (French-inspired) you can choose the chef’s tasting menu or à la carte, all farm-to-table style.
710 Pandora Avenue
From the operator of Habit Coffee (coffee lovers would know it), this ticks off many boxes — coffee, breakfast, brunch, lunch, happy hour, dinner, cocktails. It is across a concourse from a soon-to-open Top Table restaurant currently under construction; both will jump-start this sleepy block of Pandora. I had a very nice lunch of duck apricot pate with guava paste, toast, Gorgonzola cheese and my hubby’s cheeseburger (local beef, pink in middle) with smoked mayo in a brioche bun was excellent.
45 Bastion Square
Yep, that’s a Jimi Hendrix song reference but I didn’t hear him singing. It also references owner Jesse Dame’s wife Mary. Dame was operations manager for the Flying Pig in Vancouver and Victoria before taking over this below-ground space, formerly Camille’s. The comfort food, served family style, focuses on Vancouver Island and B.C. ingredients with a nose-to-tail approach with meats. Really enjoyed the lamb neck and sausage with arancini; duck, done two ways; and Cache Creek meatballs as big as tennis balls but infinitely tastier. There’s an option of a chef-chosen family style meal for $65 per person.
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