How does this idea sound to you: a gourmet long-table dinner on Lonsdale Pier with drinks flowing and hundreds of friends both new and old at your side?
When that very idea popped into the head of North Vancouver’s Alex Troll last summer, she reckoned that people would like it. A lot.
Troll, co-founder of Lower Lonsdale-based The Juicery Co., brought on graphic designer Adriana Koc-Spadaro to help turn the idea into a reality, and six weeks later the pair were welcoming 150 guests to the first ever Dinner on the Pier.
“It was amazing,” Troll says of the dinner which featured food and drink sourced and prepared by local businesses. The biggest problem they had was getting people to leave the pier when the dinner officially ended at 10 p.m.
“It was so beautiful that they didn’t want to go,” she says. “Nobody wanted to leave. We had to kind of get people off of the pier. … We walked everyone off.”
It was such a hit that they’re doing it again this year and they’ve doubled down, turning it into a dinner for 300. Luckily for them they don’t have to throw it all together in six weeks this time around. The 2016 Dinner on the Pier is scheduled for Aug. 4.
“We did it on the fly,” Troll says of last year’s event. “It was like planning a wedding in six weeks. … We get to do it a bit bigger this year.”
The inspiration for the dinner came from long-table events that Troll attended in Vancouver such as Diner en Blanc and the Araxi Longtable Dinner Series.
“I just felt like there wasn’t anything like that on the North Shore,” says Troll. “I literally was walking down by the pier and I said ‘why doesn’t anyone do a dinner down here,’ not thinking I was actually going to do it. But then I talked to the mayor and he was like, ‘Yeah, we should do it.’ And then it just kind of happened.”
There are obvious challenges associated with planning a massive outdoor dinner on a long narrow concrete strip jutting out into Burrard Inlet. Rain, for one.
“There is a Plan B,” said Troll, adding that if the weather is nasty the dinner will be held inside the Pipe Shop, the same location where cocktails will be served before the meal. “It’s beautiful too. But outside is just so nice.”
There are other concerns as well, including attacks from the sky.
“That’s one of the things I was so scared of – birds s---ting on the table!” Troll says with a laugh. “But not once did it happen. I’m going to knock on wood for this year.”
Even if a seagull steals a breadstick or a gust of wind blows off someone’s fancy hat, it’s all part of the adventure of an event like this, says Troll. Guests know what they’re signing up for.
“You’re outside, but that’s kind of what makes it fun,” she says. “It’s things to talk about. … It just gives people conversation starters, and that’s what’s so nice about it.”
This year’s event will again feature the culinary creations of Joel Green, executive chef at the Pinnacle Hotel at the Pier. Several other North Shore businesses are on board as well, including Deep Cove Brewers and Distillers, which will be supplying the beer and spirits for the night.
Partial proceeds from the event, as well as all of the money raised at an auction held on the evening, will be donated to Growing Chefs, a Vancouver-based charity that runs programs with elementary schools to help students grow their own vegetables and learn about food from local chefs.
As the co-founder of a juice company, veggies and healthy eating are close to Troll’s heart.
“I just like the idea of kids learning that food doesn’t come from a grocery store,” she says. “Someone grows it.”
The long-term plan is to hold a dinner every year, capped at 300 guests.
“As the Lower Lonsdale community keeps growing, I think it’s something exciting to look forward to every year,” says Troll. “We just wanted to bring the community together. We just wanted to have people meeting people over good food, and support Growing Chefs.”
Tickets, $160, will go on sale any day now. To sign up for ticket updates visit
dinneronthepier.com.
