Vancouver, BC Trip: Gastown & Downtown

Katie filled you in on part of our Memorial Day weekend in Vancouver, BC and covered most of our favorite spots, but these are still worth mentioning and checking out if you're in the right part of town!

Before we dive into the eating and drinking, on day two we rented bikes and cycled the seawall. Look how good we are at biking. Those Revocycle classes are paying off! This was definitely a fun activity and a good break from our otherwise food and alcohol-filled itinerary! 

What: The Diamond
Where: 6 Powell Street, Vancouver, BC
Honeys Heart: The Athenian

Our first night in Vancouver meant walking from Chinatown to Gastown, one of Vancouver's most historic neighborhoods with a mix of old and new with lots of trendy nightlife. After an extremely sketchy block of East Hastings Street, we made it to The Diamond. While we waited for a table, we went in this little side bar off of the main room that had a more limited menu and a sort of 80s/90s, minimal vibe. Katie and I wanted fancy cocktails off the menu in the other room and oddly they didn't cross over so we waited while Adam and Doug got started.

Once in the main room, the cocktails were organized by boozy, refreshing, delicate, proper, notorious, and overlooked. Under the boozy category (surprise, surprise) I chose The Athenian ($11) with an olive oil washed gin, rosemary, roasted pinenut, and Bianco vermouth. This is the second olive oil gin cocktail I've had, the other was at P.R.E.A.M., and I really liked both. This was one of my favorite cocktails we had in Vancouver.

From the "notorious" category Katie chose the Felix London Dry Gin ($11) that was a lovely combination of London dry gin, maraschino, lemon, violet, and sparkling wine.

Once Doug and Adam finished in the small bar, they joined us and Adam was drawn to The Tokyo Drift with Geikkekan sake, blanco tequila, watermelon juice, and apricot liqueur. It was a little sweet, so pretty much up Adam's alley, but also refreshing and juicy!

What: Peckinpah BBQ
Where: 2 Water Street, Vancouver, BC
Honeys Heart: 

After The Diamond, we headed to a recommended restaurant down the main street, checking out the steam clock on our way which shows off every quarter hour with whistling and shooting steam from its five whistles. Our intended destination looked pretty good, but the menu was a little pricey with main dishes ranging from $18 to $30, so instead we turned back to a BBQ spot we passed by a few blocks earlier. Adam and Katie got the pulled pork sammie, while I chose the beef brisket sammie because I'm suddenly a brisket fan. Doug varied from the group and ordered the rib ends which looked pretty delish. It was definitely a better price point, but to be honest, it was no Smokehouse 21.  Before we left Adam had to try to fried Oreos with vanilla ice cream off the special board. Personally, I prefer a regular Oreo, but it was fun to try.

What: Alibi Room
Where: 157 Alexander St, Vancouver, BC
Honeys Heart:

Before heading back to our Chinatown apartment, we made one last stop at the Alibi Room, and per our standard for the night we waited for about 10 minutes. Who knew Vancouver, BC was such a happening place? After being seated, Katie and Doug got another beer, Adam chose the highest alcohol content cider, and after much debate (I struggle with my beerducation), I settled on a rosé. The space was warm with an exposed brick wall with wood tables and accent pieces, similar to most places we went in this area. Our waiter seemed pretty over his job, but it was overall a nice stop with a pretty big beer selection if you're looking to please both beer and non-beer drinkers.

What: Meat & Bread
Where: 1033 West Pender St, Vancouver, BC 
Honeys Heart: Vego Sandwich 

On our way out of town, we tried the last spot on our list: Meat & Bread. We stopped downtown and were a little early so we walked around their convention center with a green roof lookout point (where there were def snipers, there must have been someone special coming by...) and checked out the sculptures and sea planes.

Meat & Bread opened at 11am and we were almost the first in the door. They have their signature porchetta sandwich as well as a corned beef, vego, and daily special. Adam, Doug, and I went for the prochetta, while Katie opted for the vego. I liked Katie's more, but the pork was perfectly roasted with little crispy bits. In hindsight, I wish I had tried the special which was a greek-style lamb sandwich. I would definitely recommend this for lunch, it would also be awesome to get to go and eat at the waterfront on a nice day.

Our international (so fancy) Memorial Day weekend was a success! I think the only place we went that we really didn't like (besides Portland Craft) was a pizza place for a late night bite, Uncle Fatih's. It was legitimately bad and there were so many sesame seeds on it. Hard to mess up pizza, but they did it. There were a few places we would have liked to check out like Granville Market, Earnest Ice Cream, and Brassneck Brewery, but all-in-all we had some pretty awesome food and drinks!

Vancouver (WA) Happy Hour: Chevy's

Posted by Kelly

What: Chevy's
Where: 4315 NE Thurston Way, Vancouver, WA
When: Mon-Fri 3-7pm
Honeys Heart: It's fast!

Living in Portland for the last 5 years has made me, well, a bit of a restaurant snob. Yeah, it's true. In Portland there are endless restaurant options, all equally as delicious as the last and usually priced more reasonably than chain restaurants. My favorite examples of this are Pause, where a half pound, organic, fresh ground beef burger and fries is like $8.95, try finding something that delicious at Red Robin. Or check out Justa Pasta in NW for some great homemade pasta dishes, Olive Garden has nothing on them.

Okay, enough chain restaurant bashing. They're not THAT bad. They actually have some benefits:


1.) They are predictable: You know exactly what you're going to get every time. They don't really change based on geographic area. It's like going to Starbucks in a foreign country. You know that you're going to get a coffee that tastes the same as it does in your home town.


2.) They have big dining areas: There will likely be open seating, if not in the restaurant then in the bar. Meaning you can get in, get served, and get out.

...okay so they have at least 2 benefits. Whatever. Point: my new job is taking me to new exciting places like Vancouver, WA. Well, maybe that's not very exciting, but we do have to go there for meetings about the Discovery Walk Festival happening at the end of April. Expecting traffic from Portland to Vancouver to be dreadful (the usual) we left with plenty of time to spare. Rocking the car pool lane we arrived in Vancouver 50 minutes before our meeting was planned to start. Time for HH? Yes.

We walked into Chevy's which was busy, but there was room at the bar. We sat down, each ordered a $3 blended original margarita (can't be bad!) and briefly reviewed the 50% off appetizer menu.

Five minutes later we ordered the nachos and chicken flautas. Fifteen minutes later we had our food. Twenty minutes later we were full. Five minutes later we had paid our bill and five minutes after that we were promptly arriving at our meeting.

The nachos were unique in that each chip was individually covered in beans, meat and cheese. In this case every chip is the best chip!

The chicken flautas claim to be "crispy," but I didn't find them incredibly crispy. They were filled with chicken and served with a unique dipping sauce (aka not salsa). Tasty. I feel like Mexican food (much like pizza), is generally satisfying and hard to completely ruin, so we left quite satisfied.

Overall not bad, no Por Que No?, but it's not trying to be. After we ordered we noticed people heading over to a "do-it-yourself" taco bar...this looked even quicker and probably no more expensive. I'm pretty sure we'll be back at Chevy's before our next meeting trying out the taco bar and enjoying a post long day, pre-meeting marg!