Fine to standout dishes amid pretty design elements
Mia Stainsby
Sun
Diners at the Moustache Cafe in North Vancouver. Photograph by : Steve Bosch, Vancouver Sun
It’s been 13 years since Moustache Cafe first opened on Marine Drive in North Vancouver in a compact canary yellow house. Shortly thereafter, another one opened in a white house on West Broadway (that one closed after a fire) and then finally, an expensive modern one opened on Burrard at Fifth.
Some notable chefs came and went from the restaurants (Andrey Durbach and Don Letendre) until about nine years ago when the Burrard location went bankrupt. The one in North Van kept on chugging under different ownerships.
Geoff Lundholm has been chef/owner for four years and last December, he began another chapter for Moustache — a new place and a whole new look. Frankly, it was time. The old house was dated in the era of cool and contemporary.
M Studio (which also did Earl’s Paramount) did a great job designing the restaurant in a space that was once a display suite for a highrise development. It’s the smartest looking room in North Vancouver. I especially liked the gentle punch of the black and white paisley accent wallpaper and the white runway of a countertop in the bar, going down the length of the open kitchen. (The classical landscape paintings on the wall, however, seem out of place.)
Lundholm has worked at Al Porto restaurant, Sage Bistro at UBC, Gramercy Grill in Kits, and put in a couple of years at Moustache Cafe in the ’90s.
His menu at the new location is a work in progress as he tries to capture the feel of the new space. It has Mediterranean accents (polenta, gnocchi, brandade and risotto) but there’s little sign of devotion to local ingredients and artisanal products that most front-running restaurants highlight these days.
Some dishes stand out while others are fine, but not outstanding. The short rib burger with Oka cheese is carnivore heaven. It has the regular patty but on top of that, there’s a layer of shredded short rib and Oka cheese — a burger so tall you need a Mick Jagger mouth for that tremulous first bite. However, the frites were not crisp enough and the fact that my partner and I barely made a dent in them says it all.
Brandade (a saltcod dish, with a mashed potato texture) was nicely cooked; mussels in chardonnay with basil and cream, a special, was fresh and delicious; wild mushroom soup, while muddy looking, had a lovely earthy flavour; pan-seared trout with lemon beurre blanc was perfectly cooked but the accompanying potato croquette was murdered in the deepfryer or oven, leaving a hard, overcooked exterior. Wenzel duck breast with polenta had an unusual texture, more like ham than poultry but it was tender. A half Cornish game hen with port wine/cranberry jus was a satisfying dish and here, the mashed potatoes were creamy and flavourful.
Lundholm says he’s bringing a favourite among his old regulars out of retirement — baby back-rib with blue cheese macaroni.
Desserts don’t get a ringing endorsement. A chocolate hazelnut mousse was quite good but tart tatin was an unrecognizable pile of apples on a wet crust. The plating is far too heavy-handed with thick lashings of sauces making the dish look cluttered and messy.
The room needed more buzz — better use of music would do it but so would more signs of life from servers. One server, a more senior woman, sparkled with energy and useful information but others, though young and pretty, went through the motions.
MOUSTACHE CAFE
129 West Second Ave., North Vancouver. 604-987-8461. www.moustachecafe.ca. Dinners, Tuesday to Sunday. Lunch, Thursday and Friday.
Overall: ***1/2
Food: ***1/2
Ambience: ****
Service: ***1/2
Price: $$/$$$
Restaurant visits are conducted anonymously and interviews are done by phone. Restaurants are rated out of five stars.
