Canadians celebrate their version of Thanksgiving on the second Monday in October. With turkey not an option, we trusted our stomachs to Vikram Vij and Meeru Dhalwala, husband and wife practitioners of “Curry Art.” After New York Times food writer Mark Bittman anointed Vij’s “easily among the finest Indian restaurants in the world,” expectations were more than a wee bit high. Vikram grew up in Amritsar and Bombay and worked in Vancouver restaurants before opening a 14-seat version of Vij’s in September 1994. After marrying Meeru in December; she joined him at the restaurant. In September 1996, Vij’s moved, and Meeru took over the kitchen; Vikram ran the front-of-house. As you can tell from the photo, ten years later, Vij’s is more popular than ever. Offering no reservations, prospective diners snake into an alley. Part of the first seating, by the time our butts hit our chairs, there was already a 1.5 hour wait. By the time we left, the wait reached 2.5 hours. Is it worth it? Keep reading.

This decorative door is the gateway to spectacular Indian cuisine.

This is the fashionable bar area in back, soon to be four-deep with waiting customers. Apparently booze increases patience, or at least serves as a distraction.

The dining room is simple but stylish, featuring gold lanterns with elephant cutouts and stained glass bottoms.

Vikram Vij is a gracious host and visits every table. His warmth filters down to the staff. After waiting in line in the cold, we were each handed a hot cup of homemade chai. Throughout the night, there were other free samples. A waitress circulated with platters of deep-fried potato chips known as puri and spiced cassava root fries.

Vij’s menu changes every two months, but certain dishes remain, including slabs of jackfruit in black cardamom and cumin masala (C$10). The meaty tropical fruit was well suited to the spicy sauce. The shavings of fresh ginger were a nice topper.

I don’t know that it made much sense to fly all the way to Vancouver to eat California prawns (C$12.50), but they tasted good topped with chunky coconut masala, served on a bed of smoky grilled kale.

Cubes of house made paneer were paired with spicy sautéed Brussels sprouts and back bacon (C$11). Back bacon is what we know as Canadian bacon. In Canada, it’s just bacon. The firm cheese and back bacon worked for me, but the Brussels sprouts were a little undercooked.

Each table receives unlimited plates of fluffy, butter-lashed naan. When the bread begins to cool, it’s replaced with a fresh plate. Yet another example of Vij’s impeccable service.

To maintain peak quality, Vij’s uses no pre-prepared products. According to Vij’s website, an all-female Punjabi kitchen staff works two shifts a day, roasting spices in-house, making yogurt, cheeses and ghee. This attention to detail is evident in all-time great dishes like wine marinated lamb popsicles in fenugreek cream curry on spinach potatoes (C$26). The lamb was perfectly cooked and textured, tender and wonderfully spiced. The curry-soaked spinach and potatoes were almost silky. This was a tremendous dish.

Almost on par with the lamb popsicles was the demerara sugar and tamarind marinated beef tenderloin with black cumin and khoa paranta (C$26). Khoa is an Indian cow’s milk cheese, and in the paranta that topped the dish, it was a nice chewy counterpoint. The beef couldn’t have been juicier, and didn’t require a single knife cut. The slightly sweet gravy-like sauce contained string beans, carrots, cauliflower, and zucchini.

We bypassed alcohol in favor of the house-made ginger-lemon drink (C$5). A little pitcher of syrup was made from fresh ginger, lemon, sugar, salt and pepper. We were able to control the intensity of the flavor, mixing the syrup with cold Pellegrino.

There was a short list of desserts. We ordered two of the four (C$7 apiece). Refreshing rice pudding with almonds was topped with decorative silver leaf and was cool and light. Even better were the hot orbs of pistachio cake, submerged in hot cardamom syrup. The cake absorbed the syrup beautifully, and there were whole pistachios in the centers.

Related Posts

1. Vij’s Rangoli – Vancouver, BC, Canada – November 26, 2006
2. Go Fish – Vancouver, BC, Canada – November 24, 2006
3. Rodney’s Oyster House – Vancouver, BC, Canada – November 26, 2006
4. Legendary Noodle – Vancouver, BC, Canada – November 25, 2006
5. Phnom Penh – Vancouver, BC, Canada – November 23, 2006

This entry is filed under Canada, Indian, Vancouver.