Dovetail Vancouver – Its VERY Good but its no Carbone

Dovetail is a new restaurant located in Yaletown in Vancouver. It was really busy on a Monday night which was good to see. The first available reservation, on a Monday was 9PM. This was in stark contrast to my recent trip to Toronto where Buca was doing last call at 9PM – on a Thursday! Its good to see late night thriving in Vancouver. The dining room brought back memories of the former Glowbal which was located here many restaurant iterations ago. As a tour book on Vancouver once said “you haven’t been to Vancouver if you have not been to Glowbal (this is in reference to when it was in Yaletown; it has since moved to a larger location but the party vibe and food is different). Anyway, Dovetail claims to serve California inspired food. What that means, I have no idea, but we started with the Mochiko chicken.

It was basically a fried chicken with an Asian inspired “Big Macish” sauce. The chicken was moist and flavorful and the sauce was delicious. A solid dish. Very good. The only thing is they could ease up on the sauce.

We also had the baby gem Caesar salad which was also very delicious. Lots of umami and acidity. A lot of restaurants don’t get the acidity right in a Caesar salad. That’s not an issue here. It was very very good. However, again, they were very heavy handed on the sauce. Less would perfect the dish.

For mains, we had the vodka pasta and steelhead.

The menu described the pasta as spicy but I did not detect any spice. Also, the pasta was over cooked. The flavor was just ok. My benchmark for this dish is Carbone and this one needs work. More seasoning, more balance and more al dente. This was the only miss of the night.

Lastly, the steelhead:

The fish was a huge portion. It was perfectly cooked, well seasoned and the remoulade was delicious. The meat was so moist and tender. The only feedback again, is to lighten up on the sauce. Again, too much sauce and a bit sloppy on the plating.

Overall, the service was ok. Not overly friendly but not non-existent. The food was really good and I would return to try other items. The scene is very young and loud. It would be a good place for drinks also.