I was pleased to see The Observatory Restaurant atop Grouse Mountain packed on a chilly Tuesday night in February. Even factoring in that there was a large, loud birthday celebration taking place in one corner of the room, the restaurant was still surprisingly hopping given the notorious challenge of filling dining rooms in Vancouver in this grey shoulder season.
I had not stepped foot into the room, let alone dined there, in over three years and, truth be told, I didn’t know what to expect. Grouse Mountain underwent a very public ownership change that was completed in 2017 and I had no idea what the new regime had in mind by way of vision for dining atop the mountain. Also, with very few exceptions, the crew that brings The Observatory to life every night has changed in recent years and so I was uncertain where the current team’s talents would find their best expression. Moreover, I have seen virtually nothing about the place in the press in recent times and wondered if that was a reflection of its current culinary relevance.
As it happens, my meal, a three-hour affair that unfolded at the apex of the angular room, overlooking the city on a crisp, crystal clear winter night, was staggeringly good, even considering a price tag that boldly marched far north of $200 for a dinner for two (I was accompanied to dinner by my wife DJ).
Now listen, some of you are likely to fixate on that price tag and I don’t blame you. It is important for me to point out, therefore, that I have some history with this restaurant that took my meal out of the realm of a “typical” Observatory experience. Firstly, this is the last restaurant I ever managed in my earlier career in the food and beverage industry. My experience working there was much less a nail in the coffin than it was a moment of clarity in which I realized I simply didn’t have the chops to endure the punishment of nightly fine dining service and its attendant lifestyle. Nevertheless, I still feel the odd tremor of nostalgic pride in the place and am therefore apt to order like a bit of a high roller now that I am on the other side of the dining equation. Accordingly, before tax, you can strip out roughly one-third of that bill to account for my wine choice, a bottle of lush and ripe syrah from Penticton. Secondly, in a fortuitous and unpredicted development, our server for the evening turned out to be a former team member and now somewhat distant friend (it’s hard to co-ordinate time together with those who have polar opposite working schedules), an accomplished lifetime industry professional whose social media handle is, appropriately, Wonderwaiter. There is no question in my mind that Wonder’s warm hospitality and affable, nearly undetectable upselling techniques resulted in a good portion of that spend.
We began our evening with a cocktail as we took in the stunning view and remarked, with no little irony, that the table at which we were seated was the bane of my existence back when I worked in the room because insistent, singularly-focused guests would invariably disrupt the entire flow of dinner service in order to move to that location from wherever else they were seated. I would point out that the adjacent patio of the Chalet provides a much better vantage point for photos and wistful gazing at the city lights, and there is virtually no spot in the room that does not afford at least some glimpse of the view, but I digress; those tiresome battles are no longer mine to fight.
DJ ordered the Okanagan Goat Cheese Tart, a deconstructed tart made with apples, beet root, horseradish, and peppercress topped with a rich and flaky wedge of housemade pastry. A generous quenelle of goat cheese was subtle and understated rather than pungent, and was nicely offset by a well-integrated horseradish punch and earthy, fragrant notes of fresh beets.
My appetizer was easily one of the most creative and playful dishes I’ve had yet this year: a Central Park Farms egg cooked sous-vide (that is, in a special temperature-controlled, water bath device that cooks ingredients at meticulously even, lower temperatures, preserving their moisture) and topped with house-made bacon, grilled lettuce, potato and, in an option that I decided to pursue for an additional $20, shaved black truffle. The egg was delicate and fragile, its deep yellow yolk bursting at the first touch of the fork, creating a pool for the crispy lettuce and potato.
In addition to the bacon were crispy pork scratchings, light and airy, salty and slightly smoky. The truffles, in my opinion, were superfluous, their reserved aroma and faint flavour suggesting they were perhaps summer truffles or Oregon black truffles, decidedly less indulgent and potent than their famed winter Perigord truffle cousins.
Nevertheless, the dish was fantastic overall, a sophisticated marriage of complex textures and flavours, and was something I have not seen on another local menu.
To our delight, from the current Observatory manager to the past one, was sent a generous, complimentary second appetizer, for me a powerful and bold bison tartare with shimeji mushrooms and crostini, and for DJ a light salad with flavour-concentrated, compressed apple and greens with a sharp horseradish component.
As a vegetarian with a strong aversion to mushrooms, DJ asked if the kitchen might be able to accommodate something other than the Mushroom Tart on the main menu and was pleased to receive a tasty entrée of crispy on the outside, tender on the inside soybean falafel with braised kale. My main, ordered on the recommendation of the Wonderwaiter, was Central Park Farms Chicken, a surprisingly delicious dish (I almost never order chicken), which included a crispy-skinned, succulent portion of breast, braised leg meat, heirloom carrots, bacon, and light, springy housemade biscuits, all in a rich Chasseur-style sauce.
A final dish, the Pretzel Tart, was a creative dessert of pretzel in a vanilla pastry crust, with a phenomenally tasty Bridge Brewing “All Out Stout” ice cream and salted caramel. I highly recommend this sweet treat for its malty-meets-salty flair.
6400 Nancy Greene Way. Theobservatoryrestaurant.ca. 604-998-5045. Tickets for the tram are included with advance reservations to The Observatory.
