Serial restaurant opener Sean Heather branches out into Yaletown with his latest concept, Lucky Diner
Mia Stainsby
Sun
Bar manager Mark Brand with his special bourbon shake and a top-notch burger in the recently opened Lucky Diner. Photograph by : Mark van Manen, Vancouver Sun
I think I’ve discovered another entry for the DSM (the psychiatrist’s manual of disorders): the inability to stop opening food establishments.
Sean Heather could be the textbook case. He began innocently enough with the roundly successful Irish Heather restaurant in the late ’90s. He then added the funky Shebeen Whisky Bar across the cobblestoned alley. Salty Tongue opened next door to Irish Heather, a logical extension with a daytime menu of great sandwiches, soups and baked goods.
Then the openings accelerated. Along came Limerick Junction, then Salt, as well as the pint-sized operation of a hot dog cart, Fetch, in Gastown (closed for the past few months but reopening this month). Lucky Diner is the most recent in his sizable collection of restaurants. It leap-frogged the Gastown boundaries of his previous turf into Yaletown.
Heather keeps a “little black book” of concepts and there’s at least four more to come. Pepper opens next month in Railtown. Snout, a charchuterie/fromagerie retail shop in a one-room refrigerated room, is set to open in Gastown in the spring. Heather seems to abhor repetition and his venues are no cookie-cutter businesses. They do, however, all have a certain funky je ne sais quoi.
Heather seems to attract A-list bar managers. At Salt, he scored Jay Jones, formerly of West, as manager. He employed Chris Stearns, formerly bar manager of Lumiere, for a short time as well. At Lucky Diner, Mark Brand, former Chambar bar manager, is intoxicating diners with a milkshake — a bourbon milkshake so smooth, you could easily drink yourself into a stupor.
Meanwhile, the food is straight-ahead diner and the place is open for breakfast, brunch, lunch and dinner. Chef Dan Tigthelaar was sous chef at Aurora Bistro and, in case you’re wondering, his name means “tilesetter” in Dutch.
It’s a menu with stacks of pancakes for breakfast, grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch and burgers and meatloaf for din-din. Prices seem somewhat retro, with dinner mains averaging $9 to $15 and topping off at $20 for a 28-day aged half-pound ribeye.
I’m wrong. It’s not entirely straight-ahead diner food. The chicken pot pie for instance has hidden charms. The chicken is free range Maple Hill Farm. Before roasting it off, the leg is removed to make a pampered confit, which is then mixed with the roasted meat. The dish comes with sides of buttermilk mashed potatoes and mashed minted peas — the idea being, you stir some of those into the pot pie to thicken the sauce after bursting through the puff pastry cover. “It’s a have-fun pot pie,” says Heather.
I had fun with the chili dog with chipotle chili and sweet corn relish. Like the burger, it’s a wide load and one must work the mandibles to accommodate the tall, proud, spreading structures. If not careful, the chili in the hot dog could slither down your forearm but that’s part of the fun, staining my white top and all, ha, ha. The burger meat is organic and very flavourful.
I wasn’t quite as enamoured of the smoked belly bacon-wrapped meat loaf in the same way (I like it more loose and moist). Conversely, the wild mushroom, cheddar, parmesan and asiago mac and cheese, which was too loose and moist (I like it tighter and baked off and cuttable).
Iceberg lettuce in the retro salad cannot be hailed for its flavour but I do like its crispy crunch that other lettuces lack. Crabcakes served over oyster chowder were nice and crabby and if you like pecan pie, you’ll like the Lucky Diner version with maple syrup and bourbon and a crust that did not, as is commonplace, turn me off.
It’s a Yaletown kind of space (clean, open and uncluttered) with homages to the old-time diner with some retro furniture, Janice Joplin belting out Piece of My Heart and daily Blue Plate Specials. Missing, though, are hard-bitten, gum-chewing waitresses in uniform with their order pads. To make up, there’s a sassy bourbon list as well as a friendly wine list, with everything available by the glass. Bartender Brand’s cocktails stick to the old-fashioneds, like, well, the Old Fashioned and Manhattan.
The restaurant motto under the logo reads: “Come sad. Leave happy.” Just knock back those bourbon milkshakes.
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LUCKY DINER
Overall: 3 1/2
Food: 3 1/2
Ambience: 3 1/2
Service: 3 1/2
Price $/$$
1269 Hamilton St., 604-662-8048. Open 7 days a week. 11:30 a.m. to late, Monday to Friday; 10 a.m. to late Saturday and Sunday.
Restaurant visits are conducted anonymously and interviews are done by phone. Restaurants are rated out of five stars.
© The Vancouver Sun 2007
