These are 12 of the best new restaurants to open in B.C. in 2024

These are the best new restaurants to open in Vancouver (and beyond!) in 2024.

Published Dec 26, 2024  •  Last updated 1 hour ago  •  6 minute read

Burrata and beets dish at Amici. Mia Stainsby photo

Tough! That’s restaurant-speak for 2024. It was another year of inflation, staff shortages and lingering COVID effects. And of restaurant closures.

“Closures tend to be centred around end-of-life leases where continuation makes no economic sense,” says B.C. Restaurant and Foodservices Association head, Ian Tostenson. “I believe last year there were more closings than openings.”  I received notice of the inventive East Van restaurant, Straight and Marrow, as I was writing this.

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But when the going gets tough, the tough get going. Pas de sweat, they say, and chase their passion.

“The openings are for smaller, specialty, ethnic, lower overhead concepts,” says Tostenson, who believes things “should improve as interest rates reduce and consumers start to regain their spending confidence.”

I haven’t written reviews of several of these best new restaurants picks but I’ve visited them all and you’ll see more detailed reviews coming up in the New Year.  I list the best alphabetically.

Amici Italian Wine Bar (READ OUR REVIEW HERE)

33724 Essendene Ave., Abbotsford | amiciwinebar.com

Not many Abbotsford restaurants punch above average and owner Josh Vanderheide has been busy changing that. Amici is one of his East Abby Hospitality Group venues and he wants it to reflect the agricultural base of the community. “We haven’t effectively translated it (local farms) to food culture when it lands on the table,” he says. Don’t miss the oomphy, chewy focaccia with different toppings.

Elem

2110 Main St., Vancouver | elemvancouver.com

The owners of Zarak Afghan restaurant next door have joined up with chef Vish Mayekar (Elio Volpe, La Tana, Pepino’s) to create a cool, sophisticated space with creative food and drink. Mayekar brings what he loves to eat to the menu — Hawaiian kanpachi tiradito, Hong Kong chicken, Dungeness crab toast, duck fried rice — it’s a world of food. Winnie Sun (mixologist at both Zarak and Elem) is a phenom, crafting beautiful flavours out of impossibilities, partly reflecting the sustainability ethos here.

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Elio Volpe (READ OUR REVIEW HERE)

540 West 17th Ave., Vancouver | eliovolpe.com

The latest in the Banda Volpi group (Savio Volpe, La Tana, Pepino’s Spaghetti House), Elio is “the lighter yin to Savio’s yang,” owner Paul Grunberg says. The menu features seafoods, thin-crust pizzas, big salads and house-made pastas that can be ordered as a primi or secondi course. The airy room feels like sunlight on a Sicilian beach.

Gary’s (READ OUR REVIEW HERE)

1485 West 12th Ave., Vancouver | garysrestaurant.ca

This little gem scored a Bib Gourmand at the 2024 Michelin awards  for “high quality food at a reasonable cost.” The menu’s described as European, with French and hints of British and the kitchen sources locally from organic growers. I recall a chicken liver and foie gras profiterole with brandied cherry compote and if it’s on the menu, I’d advise you to try it. Wines, like the food, are low intervention, sustainably farmed and processed.

Good Thief room. Mia Stainsby photo

Good Thief (READ OUR REVIEW HERE)

3336 Main St., Vancouver | goodthief.ca

Good Thief is different from Anh and Chi, its next-door older sibling. Good Thief’s about nhâu — getting together, drinking, eating, and celebrating togetherness, the owners say. It identifies as cocktail-forward, but the Vietnamese food stands on its own. You can have delicious oxtail with pho demi-glace, ling cod with dill and turmeric soubise or with frogs’ legs and balut (embryonic quail egg, not the traditional duck).

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Hamachi with cucumber ice at Le Crocodile by Rob Feenie. Mia Stainsby photo

Le Crocodile by Rob Feenie (READ OUR REVIEW HERE)

909 Burrard St., Vancouver | lecrocodilerestaurant.com

The DNA includes Au Crocodile in Strasbourg, where Feenie cooked for a three-Michelin star chef, a little bit of Vancouver’s Le Crocodile, where he cooked with mentor Michel Jacob, and a little bit of Lumiere, where Feenie bewitched with his modern dishes.  He’s retained many of the Jacob’s dishes but lightened and modernized them, as he has done with the room. The food shows his high level of technical prowess.

Lila (READ OUR REVIEW HERE)

3941 Main St., Vancouver | lilarestaurant.ca

Shira Blustein (Acorn vegetarian restaurant) and Meeru Dhalwala (former Vij’s chef) have teamed up to open this Indian restaurant with sustainability and community-building as its foundation. Dishes are mostly vegetarian except for a couple of seafood, options like the Arctic char with Indian risotto. Wines are from biodynamic and organic producers.

Janevca dining room. Mia Stainsby photo

Janevca (READ OUR REVIEW HERE)

429 Lampson St., Esquimalt | janevca.ca

Esquimalt suddenly became a dining destination when Janevca opened this summer as part of the Rosemead boutique hotel development in a lavishly restored Samuel Maclure building. The chef, Andrea Alridge, learned the art of cooking with fire at CinCin Ristorante and Savio Volpe in Vancouver and almost every dish here has been touched by smoke or fire. The food­­­­­ — rustic, flavourful, refined — leans to Italian, but goes off piste with dishes like scallop crudo with pyanggang sauce (a blackened coconut curry sauce that salutes Alridge’s Filipino background) and wood-grilled half chicken with siu haau (Chinese barbecue) sauce.

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Meo room. Mia Stainsby photo

Meo (READ OUR REVIEW HERE)

265 East Pender St., Vancouver | meochinatown.com

Part of the Bao Bei and Kissa Tanto squad, Meo is equally unique but more cocktail-centric. Head bartender Denis Bykov is down with modern techniques (clarifications, fermentations, infusions) with many nods to Asian flavours. Chef de cuisine Macià Bagur has three-Michelin star experience and you’ll find influences from his Spanish homeland — like fideuà, a Valencian noodle dish. Exec chef Joël Watababe’s Trinidadian Doubles dish tugged at my heart.

Oku Izakaya

2 Water St., Vancouver | okuizakayabar.com

This place slays as an izakaya. The food’s casual but inviting and the room’s got Gastown character and great buzz. Owner-chef Takeshi Hasegawa has cooked since he was eight, helping at his mother’s culinary school in Nagoya and starting work at an izakaya at 15. Most recently, he was vice-president of the Guu chain of izakayas in Vancouver (after starting as head chef) and now he’s having spirited fun behind the counter. On the menu, you’ll find temaki, sashimi, sushi and cooked dishes like deep-fried taro potato balls, poached black cod with ponzu, Nagoya-style chicken karaage.

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Sushi Hyun Omakase (READ OUR LIST OF BEST SUSHI RESTAURANTS IN METRO VANCOUVER HERE)

795 Jervis St., Vancouver

Talk about bespoke. This six-seater books only one seating at lunch and another at dinner — that is, 12 guests per day. It allows chef-owner Ju Hyun Lee time to share his pride and passion with guests. But such attention comes at a cost — $300 per person for dinner and $200 for lunch. While working in Korea and Japan at two- and three-Michelin starred restaurants, he made connections with the best artisans, fishers, and other suppliers for his restaurant. It certainly shows in the food.

Sushi Masuda (READ OUR REVIEW HERE)

1066 West Hastings St., Vancouver | sushimasada.com

Another of two notable sushi omakase bar to open this year. This one’s situated within another Japanese restaurant and was awarded a Michelin star this year. Chef Yoji Masuda also earned a Michelin Young Chef award. There are six seats, and one turnover per evening.  Dinner is $260 for an 18- to 20-course sushi omakase. The seafood is impeccable as are all the ingredients. About three quarters of the seafood is curated for him by a trusted contact at the famous Toyosu Fish Market in Tokyo and the rest is local.

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Get more dining suggestions in our other restaurant guides:

• These 18 Vancouver restaurants are Hollywood North favourites
• Where to eat pizza in Metro Vancouver?
• Where to eat sushi in Metro Vancouver?
• Where to eat breakfast in Metro Vancouver?
• Where to eat ramen in Metro Vancouver?
• Where to eat Italian in Metro Vancouver?
• Is it Happy Hour yet? The 10 best places to check out in Metro Vancouver
• Cheers: Here are the 10 best restaurants for happy hour in Vancouver

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