Since 2002, Air Canada enRoute has embarked on a mission to put Canada’s best new restaurants on the map.
This year, they picked up our tradition of flying one undercover writer coast to coast in search of the places and people reshaping Canada’s diverse culinary landscape. Along the way, they met chefs embracing new ways to share cultural identity on the plate and teams keen to prompt table talk about sustainability and equity advances.
Opening a restaurant has always been a feat, and those with the courage and grit to pull it off over the past year deserve special recognition.
Air Canada enRoute has singled out the top 30 spots in the running for recognition and Kitsilano’s own Delara made the cut. Here is what they had to say:
The undertow of pungent, tangy and nutty flavours that permeate the menu at this home to modern Iranian cuisine starts with a Hop Plum Spritzer with a top note of acidic dried lime. It recedes and then rises with a starter of roasted cauliflower, spicy yogurt, hazelnut and sumac, and peaks in the chicken and barberry main. Iranian folk songs bounce off white walls while carved mashrabiya panels seem to let in a warm Kashan breeze. A boldly tattooed server batting baby blue eyelids reminds us we are in Kitsilano and brings our meal full circle with the gentle citrus and haunting floral note of the turmeric and orange cake.
Delara | 2272 West 4th Avenue | 604-730-4325 | delararestaurant.ca
Last modified: August 18, 2022
