A handful of Vancouver restaurants are looking to the future after being inducted into the exclusive international club of eateries rated by the Michelin Guide.
At a glitzy ceremony Thursday night, eight Vancouver restaurants were awarded a coveted Michelin star, while a dozen more were tapped for a “Bib Gourmand” designation, which recognizes high-quality eateries that go easy on a diner’s pocketbook.
MAP: Vancouver’s Michelin star and Bib Gourmand-rated restaurants
Among the winners was Andrea Carlson, chef-owner of Main Street’s Burdock & Co., and the only woman to be recognized in the guide’ inaugural Vancouver ratings.
“It’s a tremendous acknowledgement,” Carlson, who has run the restaurant for just under a decade, told Global News on Friday. “It’s an international award, it means so much to us for that reason.”
The small 32-seat room at Burdock & Co. is comfortable but decidedly understated, missing the fancy trappings one might expect from a classic “fine dining” restaurant.
But with Michelin inspectors, what matters is strictly what’s on the plate rather than the service or the environment.
Carlson said she credits her menus’ deep focus on local products and seasonal inspirations with catching their eye.
“We’ve always been really committed to sustainability with this restaurant … sustainable seafoods, locally produced foods, organic produce, and relationships have been built with small scale farmers – those are the key elements of this restaurant,” she said.
“Something that is shifting from what I see with Michelin and some of the other international award groups is they are more interested in seeing a true expression on the plate, rather than it being a more traditional expression of fine dining.”
About 10 minutes down the road on the edge of Chinatown, the family that runs a Vancouver dining institution was also celebrating Friday.
After nearly 40 years in business, Vietnamese-Cambodian restaurant Phnom Penh was awarded a Michelin Bib Gourmand designation.
That title recognizes high-quality eateries offering two courses, a glass of wine and a dessert for under $60.
When Solange Huynh first helped her family, refugees from Cambodia escaping the Khmer Rouge, open the restaurant she was just 20 years old. The tight family ties that have powered decades of successful business, she said, are also one of the kitchen’s secret ingredients.
“It’s the quality of the food and the taste and the love from our family,” she said. “My dad always said (there needs) to be unity in the family, working hard together, no fights.”
Her son Alex Ming said the family is now gearing up for the already busy restaurant to get busier.
“It’s the greatest achievement we’ve ever had, among all the achievements we already have done for our family,” he said. “It’s a very proud moment and it means the world to us. It’s quite a prestigious institution.”
The Michelin Guide started out more than a century ago in France. Originally packed with maps, gas station locations and tourist attractions, it was intended by the tire company that created it to get more people driving.
In the 1920s it began handing out stars to fine dining restaurants, and the company now says it rates more than 40,000 establishments on three continents.
Last month, the guide came to Canada for the first time, handing out a single two-star rating in Toronto and a dozen other one-stars.
Now in Vancouver, Globe and Mail food critic Alex Gill said it was worth noting what the inspectors focused on.
“We are known for casual fine dining, not the same sort of fancy — well, we have some, but not the same amount of fancy restaurants as you’d find in New York or London, it’s a more casual scene,” she said.
“A lot of small, intimate, personal restaurants. And those are the ones that won last night.”
While winning a Michelin star can come with a huge boost in business — 20 per cent for a single star, 40 per cent for two stars and 100 per cent for three stars, according to Joël Robuchon, the late French chef awarded more stars than any other — Carlson said she has no plans to change things up at Burdock & Co.
She plans to keep working with small local producers, like the Granville Island sake business that grows the restaurant’s rice in the Fraser Valley, and just focus on putting out great plates.
“If we were not able to work in that way, I would not have this business, I would leave this industry,” she said.
“It’s just about what’s on the plate, so how you take it from a one star to a two star, I can’t even imagine.”
Vancouver’s Michelin star-rated restaurants are:
- AnnaLena
- Barbara
- Burdock & Co.
- iDen & QuanJuDe Beijing Duck House
- Kissa Tanto
- Masayoshi
- Published on Main
- St. Lawrence
Vancouver’s Bib Gourmand-rated restaurants include:
- Anh and Chi
- Chupito
- Fable Kitchen
- Fiorino, Italian Street Food
- Kin Kao Song
- Little Bird Dim Sum + Craft Beer
- Lunch Lady
- Nightshade
- Oca Pastificio
- Phnom Penh
- Say Mercy!
- Vij’s
Comments