Boutique hotel opens farm-to-table restaurant with Will Lew as chef.
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Where: Versante Hotel, 8499 Bridgeport Rd., Richmond
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When: Breakfast and dinner, daily; lunch, Monday to Friday.
Info: 604-242-2750; versantehotel.com/taste
Chef Will Lew doesn’t easily surrender his time to sleep.
“I get to sleep at four or five every morning. And I have one meal a day to save time,” he says, speaking breathlessly. To save time, no doubt.
He’s the chef at Bruno restaurant at the new Versante Hotel in Richmond. The flagship restaurant opened in August along with Versante Bar, which offers take out and pastries by day and cocktails by night. He’s also responsible for banquets and room service and is one of seven Ocean Wise ambassadors across Canada supporting sustainable seafood and conservation. He was previously the chef for Ocean Wise and, before that, for Notch 8 at the Fairmont Hotel Vancouver.
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It’s just the start of what will burglarize his sleep. Alaïa Lounge opens this fall with dramatic views from the 12th floor of the hotel. And soon, he’ll oversee the food at Club Versante, “a dining and lifestyle club” in the second of three towers on the multi-complex property.The food venues will include the “super high-end” Cask Whisky Lounge, OO La Cha Cafe and Beijing Beijing. Celebrity chef Alvin Leung, chef/owner with two and one-Michelin star restaurants, will be the non-resident chef at Beijing Beijing but Lew will oversee his menu.
And in a few years, he also takes on food and beverage at two hotels in the works on Vancouver Island by the Versante developer, Michael Ching.
For Lew, it feels like destiny. In his youth, he was a violinist and artist and studied animal biology at university. While at university, he went looking for a job dressed in his suit and was hired on the spot to work the dish pit at a cool Yaletown restaurant.
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“I watched the line, the hustle and bustle. I ruined my suit and got off at 4 a.m. but I was hooked.”
Cooking, he thought, combined his interest in the arts and science.
“I saw the best of the industry and the worst of the industry that night and I thought I want to do better. I wanted to use food as art and as a canvas for communication. We’re so disconnected from each other but it’s in our DNA to share.”
At Bruno restaurant, he walks the walk of connecting people via delicious food, sourced locally. The generous portions and options for family-style dining add to a communal vibe.
You might think it’s an expensive restaurant — under the ‘Large Plates’, you’ll see $58 for truffle lavender duck and $150 for bone-in rib-eye steak, but these large plates can feed four people.
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“I grew up eating Chinese food every weekend and didn’t really appreciate what was going on. There’d be dish after dish, going around the lazy Susan. Food was a way to show care,” he says.
From the Share Plates section, we ordered the scroll loaf ($12), the Kurabata pork belly ($12), and truffle potatoes ($10). Oh my! What thrills! The scroll loaf, made with croissant dough is layered with rosemary and pecorino and baked into a large roll; you’re given two large rolls accompanied by foie gras butter. It’s beautifully made and you want to devour, but don’t! Curb your enthusiasm. Remember what I said about generous portions.
A richly flavoured pork belly was deeply delicious. After curing and marinating, it’s cooked by sous vide and then deep-fried in a starch blend. While sizzling hot, it’s glazed in a maple syrup, soy, black garlic, ginger and scallion mix.
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The truffle potatoes came heaped on a plate. They’re steamed, then air dried for a day and finally fried and tossed in truffle butter, truffle bits, parmesan and herbs.
Under ‘Small Plates’, we expected small plates. Nope! A top of line grilled Wagyu flank steak ($29), was hefty and juicy and sat atop grilled heirloom tomatoes, grapes, shishito peppers, ripped artisan bread. We mopped up chimichurri sauce with the pieces of steak. The tomatoes rang with so much sweet flavour; they and the grapes were grown at an organic lavender and produce farm on Cortes Island operated by developer Ching.
Nduja tagliatelle ($28) is tossed with heirloom tomato sauce with smoked bacon and nduja (Calabrian pork sausage) and topped with shaved fennel and grana padano. Dungeness crab croquettes ($24) are almost all crab — 75 per cent Dungeness and 25 per cent Bell River blue crab from P.E.I. The two fist-sized croquettes come with baby green artichoke heart, Sicilian olives and nduja remoulade.
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If you opt for the family-style under “Large Plates,” dishes include the 52-ounce bone-in ribeye ($150) and truffle lavender duck ($58), served as six croquettes and two breasts. Lew just replaced a kurobuta rosemary porchetta with a platter of line-caught whole sablefish and char-broiled whole giant Pacific octopus leg.
And for a go-for-the-gusto meal, there’s the Bruno Tasting Board Experience for $125 per person with an oyster cart, appetizers, entree platter and desserts.
For our desserts, we opted for a pavlova crowned in fruits and berries before this summery dessert took its leave for the year. Bruléed stone fruits, berries, nuts and petals and coconut mascarpone cream topped the meringue. Bravely, we ordered another: honey lavender soft-serve ice cream with Cortes Island berries and pistachio brittle. There was enough dessert for four and we managed to eat for three.
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There’s work to be done on the largely Italian but still-in-progress wine list and ditto, the cocktail list. There were only two on offer when I visited. As for service, staff are attentive and super friendly but our server had little knowledge of wines and couldn’t answer questions. While staff are still being trained, best to ask for wine advice maitre d’ Alessandro De Pieri or general manager Brad Stanton who’s worked as bar manager at Hawksworth and Blue Water Cafe.
And I’m hoping the directions to the hotel from the parking lot has been fixed — a sign pointed us to a stairwell with no cell reception, and we got locked in there. If you’re entering from the parking lot, it’s weird, butbest to walk through the hand-washing area outside the washrooms and down the stairs to the lobby and to return, take the elevator from the lobby.
Source: vancouversun.com
