Reinventing a legendary room is never easy, but when the Listel Hotel decided to close long-running O'Doul's, the move afforded no shortage of opportunities.
In 10 days or so they'll pull the wraps off Forage, a smaller and more casual space than its predecessor, but with a personality and mantra suited to the times. The area released by the smaller room, already leased, will soon emerge as an art gallery bathed in natural light.
As the name promises, Forage will fit the seasonal/sustainable mold, bringing to the fore as many ingredients as realistically possible - locally sourced and menu in tune with the time of year.
While "going green" has become little more than a convenient buzzword for some, it's certainly not the case for the Listel. The hotel has been aggressively pursuing a raft of practical sustainable policies, such as a new heating system powered by a batch of rooftop solar heating panels, heat pumps and high-efficiency boilers.
Forage is a groundbreaker in restaurant terms in that the new room (and kitchen equipment) has been shaped in partnership with Green Table Network, B.C. Hydro and LiveSmart B.C. The idea is to showcase a sustainable room by placing every conceivable aspect of the operation under the microscope to see how to make it as environmentally friendly and cost-efficient as possible. Even the plates at Forage have been chosen because they were fired only once and hence require less energy to produce.
If O'Doul's was expansive, its successor is decidedly compact and intimate, with the focus of the room a large and well-stocked oval bar. Taps (eight of them) are entirely B.C. and decidedly craft brew-driven by the likes of Storm Black Plague, Crannog Red Branch and Driftwood Fat Tug - with a spare for revolving casks.
The Evoke-designed space has more the feel of a small, contemporary gastropub than hotel dining room. And the more casual feel carries through to the carbon-friendly kitchen, still in the hands of chef Chris Whittaker.
With backing from hotel GM Jim Mockford, Whittaker saw what was needed to execute a truly sustainable menu. The chef, an accomplished outdoorsman and hunter, fully grasps the meaning of farm to table. "I'm not a trophy hunter," he says. "I hunt to feed my family."
In short: he walks the talk. For example, his menu favours bison over beef, which he generally doesn't accept as sustainable.
Checking in at the bar, chances are you'll be seduced by the list of snacks to enjoy with your pint or glass of Blasted Church Hatfield's Fuse or Nichol Pinot Gris (one of four Okanagan drops on tap).
A measure of the chef's sense of fun but also his thoroughness is the bowl of corn popped in ducked fat and tangled with pork crackling - and the fat rendered from other dishes does double duty ($5). 'Skillets' include salmon bellies, end cuts from fillets, which would otherwise be wasted, with pickled sea asparagus ($10).
Top of our tasting preview was an artfully assembled plate of seared Albacore tuna, with black berry and fir jelly (from a wide range of preserves made this season), small chanterelles and succulent brown butter gnocchi with squash pure. A symphony of fall flavours, it's a good representation of what to expect from Forage, whose larger plates will come in at $20 or less.
Forage is the next chapter in Vancouver's love affair with local eating that found its beginnings with the 100 Mile Diet. And it might just be a (sustainable, of course) page burner.
info@ hiredbelly.com
Forage
1300 Robson St. 604-684-8461
www.foragevancouver.com
