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The Boathouse serves west coast fare in a relaxed atmosphere.
Not sure about the sanity of the poster who is said to be stalking the Boathouse but I can attest that my last experiences in Porty Moody, White Rock and West Vancouver were terrible. Lousy service, overpriced food, and serving sizes that were questionable. It is wierd that this wave of ineptness has swept over the Boathouse restaurants. The one in West Vancouver was pratically empty on a warm sunny day a few weekends ago. And news alert...they charge for bread. Can you imagine that? A restaurant charges you 45 bucks for a tiny little prime roast steak and then charge you a couple bucks for bread? Wow. I am not the said to be crazy guy that posted below but I am here to say that sometimes crazy can be right on the money.
This is one of these places that frustrates the crap out of me! The potential of this place is outstanding but the owners/managers(?) don't seem to want to do anything with it. Maybe they just hope the wave of summer tourists will get them through? It's this beautiful location and great idea (downstairs bar, 2nd floor patio and dining room upstairs) so really they should have it all right? Wrong - & it seems like its been on a steady downslide for the last year or more. To be honest, the only reason I kept going there is it's local and there are some really great staff there (well in the diningroom and the bar... the deck staff are not quite up to par. But the problem is every time I go, another great staff member has moved on? Take the hint from your staff owners!! If your awesome staff keep leaving and only mediocrity remains... what is that telling you? I think this place has so much potential but the management seems set on running it into the ground... trying to end on something positive though - the food is still pretty good and nothing beats that sunset - but isn't there a Cactus Club opening up across the street soon? Tell me Boathouse - why would i want to bring you my business when I could go see them?
This place has a beautiful location. Even we didn't have a table near window, we were able to watch ocean and the ships.
The menu could have been better seafood selection. The food was nice. It is a good place to host your visitors with a good price.
having the valet service is also a great idea because it is difficult to find a parking spot there.
This restaurant can be excellent if they improve the look of the plates and renovate the furniture a bit.
After a recommendation from my coworker, I decided to come out here for lunch on a sunny day. My friend and I were seated out on their covered patio by the window. The view was nice, but that was the only pleasant thing during our meal. To start off with, the servers there are not happy to help you out at all and stand around talking to each other while playing music on the stereo. When they took our orders, they weren't much of a help either. We ended up ordering a calamari to share, fish and chips with cod, and their special seafood grill.
The service was just.. bad. Our server left after finishing her shift (not that she was very good at her job anyways) and then someone else came by to tell us they would be helping us out for the rest of the meal. The entire time he talked to us, he had these ridiculous shades on (rainbow semi-rimless shades that looked like they were from a snowboarder back in the 80's). I found it extremely rude to have shades on while talking to a customer. I know it's sunny, but that's just disrespectful. I don't know what the policy is there, maybe they're allowed to wear them while working on the patio area. He did not come by to ask about our food until 3/4 into our main.
The calamari was terrible. It was tasteless, just warm, and not crunchy. The batter did not stick to the calamari at all. What looked like a lot of herbs on it did not help. They dumped in diced onions too.. don't know why cause it did nothing to add for taste. Definitely not worth the 13 dollars I paid. My friend's fish and chips were decent, but definitely nothing special, they have better fish and chips served in Lonsdale Quay in a little shop over this known restaurant. Not worth 20 dollars for two pieces of fish and fries and salad. Worst of all was my seafood grill which is their "specialty plate". The dish is like 16 or 17 dollars, and I expected my portions since it says grill. Nowhere in the menu does it say skewer, but what I got was a skewer of two bite sized over cooked salmon, one piece of scallop, and one prawn on top of a handful of undercooked veggies. I was appalled and I let the server know when he finally wandered over from talking to his coworkers.
At least the server did the decent thing and took my "grill" off the bill. I will DEFINITELY not be back will not recommend it to anyone else.
Part of the reason for the poor service rating has nothing to do with our actual server NYE so let me explain. I called to make reservations here at least four weeks in advance. A few days prior to NYE made a call to reconfirm the reservations and they had no record of me making my prior reservation. Very frustrating. Reminds me of the old Seinfeld episode. "You can take the reservation you just can't hold the reservation".
Needless to say there was more than enough room here NYE, a reservation really wasn't even required but that is besides the point.
My dining partner and I had the 8:30pm seating. It was a three course meal at $65.00 per person. My appetizer included asparagus with goat cheese and a few bits of sundried tomatoe. There is a very fine line between el dente and raw veggies. My asparagus was almost raw, like they just dipped it in hot water. Too el dente for me thanks. My partner had the chili chicken appy and he was quite happy with it. A very basic dish of chicken cubes in a thai type sauce.
For the main course I ordered the steak with lobster and crab meat. My partner the 1.5lb Lobster. My steak was very good and done perfectly although the crab/lobster meat was very sparse and not that tasty actually. The steak came with terrible mashed/garlic potatoes that I hardly touched.
My dining partner on the other hand really enjoyed what looked like a very nice sized lobster.
The finishing touch was a berry cheesecake and a key lime pie. I had the Key Lime Pie, quite tasty but a little on the smallish size.
In conclusion the meal was just okay for me. Not worth the $65.00 charge. The final bill btw included a glass of beer and a glass of very over priced wine was $180.00 including tip. Not a very good value in my mind.
Our server as well was just okay. A nice enough fellow with a tinge of "I don't really want to be here tonight" sort of a feeling. He was there when we needed him although was a little scarce one or two times, needed more water but couldn't track him down.
What really sort of shocked me was the lack of people in the restaurant. We sat in the top floor of the restaurant for the 8:30pm seating and it was half full the entire time we were there. Not really sure what that says.
Restaurants are afraid of losing business with the HST coming into place as well as an economy that is still in recovery mode. It would really be beneficial for restaurants to try to get everything right. The reservation thing was really a turn off. The cost of the meal I believe was also about 20/30 dollars more than I think it should of been.
Every time I go to the Boathouse I think there might be a new chef and the food might have improved. Lovely setting but not many people eating lunch on a sunny weekday. Should be packed. How do they screw up yam fries? The chef adds loads of sea salt on them, I guess to make you drink more. These days kitchens should not add salt to anything...let the customer do it or ask first. The server was very understanding and quickly brought us another salt-free serving, she agreed it was excessive! At $6.99 kind of pricey. We shared a lobster shrimp pita with shaved fennel, lettuce and tarragon mayo ($15.99). Large portion so good idea to share. Not bad but the mayo needed a bit more bite to it. This place has the potential to be full every day in the summer.
This review is a little late, but I can still remember the meal as if it were yesterday.
I went to the Boathouse for my birthday dinner for two reasons - they give you a $25 gift certificate on your birthday for signing up for their email newsletter, and it was Lobsterfest time! I had actually gone to the Boathouse for Crabfest in December and it was amazing, so I couldn't wait to go back for the lobster.
My friend and I ordered the chilled seafood tower - which, at $49.99 is a little steep for an appetizer - but the quality of seafood is top notch. There were oysters, mussels, smoked salmon, jumbo prawns and a selection of sauces, spreads and breads. Wonderful!
For dinner, I chose the steak (tenderloin) & lobster - both were fantastic. My steak was so flavourful and tender that it practically melted in my mouth. My friend chose the stuffed salmon, which he really enjoyed. I tried a bite of it, and found the salmon to be a little overcooked for my liking, but for him it was perfect.
The service was top notch - very attentive and unobtrusive, and friendly without being 'fake'. Water and wine glasses were topped up when appropriate and our server really made the entire evening flow seamlessly. The view really added to the experience and for all these reasons, the Boathouse has always been one of my favourite "special occasion" restaurant choices. I can't wait to head over soon to enjoy 'appy hour' on the patio.
Everything about this experience was terrible. To arriving at a grubby deck, with screaming children running around at one end, lacklustre food and very poor service.
Sunset on a deck sounds great but not when the deck and the furniture is grubby with dirty windows. We were seated and ordered drinks but were then interrupted 3 times while try to enjoy the drinks by the waiter who wanted to know if we were ready to order. We finally ordered 2 appies and 4 mains. Appies - chili chicken and teriyaki chicken wings. They arrived but without cutlery or napkins. Couldn't find our waiter. Finally flagged another waiter down who couldn't get the cutlery or napkins for us (even thought he service area was a couple of feet away). Finally got cutlery and napkins to find that both appies were deep fried and covered with a glutinous, overly sweet and overly salty sauce. No finger bowl for the finger food. When the waiter came to remove the appies he couldn't help but notice that we left half on both plates but he didn't say a thing.
Waiter suggested the fresh halibut as a main as it was his favourite. It arrived and was comprised of a large piece of halibut - again deep fried - with 4 greenbeans, also fried and 1 potato cut in 4 and boiled until death so that the skin and outlayer of potato had separted from the rest and then guess what, deep fried. The plate was swimming in a glutinous, overly sweet and overly salty teriyaki sauce. Yuk. We paid and left and none of the staff acknowleged our leaving or thank us at all.
Very poor service - will never go back again and will never recommend to anyone.
In a desparate attempt to match "Great view" with "Good value", I brought some out-of-town friends to the Boathouse for dinner last week. Boy, do I feel like a sucker!
The view and the patio are stellar, but you essentially forgo any chance of a good meal because the pub menu, not the diningroom menu, is served on their deck. On other occasions, I have ordered from the separate diningroom menu and had a great meal, but alas I was horribly dissapointed at the unimaginative and poor quality pub menu. I ordered the "best thing on the menu", according to our server - miso crusted halibut. While the fish was delicious, it was plated over a pool of the most concentrated teriyaki sauce! I had to tell the waiter that it destroyed my meal afterwords and thankfully, he had it removed from our bill. My guests complained afterwards of an underwhelming caesar salad, uninspiring crab stuffed prawns, and yet another seafood dish drenched in teryaki sauce! It was really embarrassing because I had boasted about the restaurant prior to our visit!
To top everything off, the service was appallingly bad. If I'm paying $28 for a meal, I expect better than a bumbling beach bum half serving me. Our waiter neglected share plates for appys, no cutlery, drinks ran late, and he brought hot water instead of cold water. The icing on the cake was his description of their fish speacial "A bunch of stuff in a bowl"... he must have been high.
I won't go back to this location because the quality just wasn't there for the high prices you pay. I've had better luck with the Kits location, but as I said, it was in the diningroom.
I visit this restaurant at least once a year, as it's delicious but too pricey for regular dining. Every time (for the past 8 years) I've been very satisfied, except for one dinner during their 'lobsterfest' last spring when the 4 lobster tails ordered for our table were puny. Besides that, I had my birthday supper at this location this past Tuesday night and had a great experience. It was a busy evening, and although we weren't seated by the window, we still had a fantastic view of English Bay at sunset. Our server was very attentive and pleasant. The shared platter I had wanted to order was no longer on the menu but our server made it happen. We started with the the crab cakes which were small but delicious. They serve warm sourdough bread with herb butter for free, but I didn't want to fill up on bread. The platter consisted of 2 sirloin steaks, an entire lobster split down the middle, 2 alaskan king crab legs, 2 skewers of prawns (6 giant prawns in total), 6 mussels, garlic mashed potatoes, green beans and cherry tomatoes. Phew! (They charged us $90 for the platter)
The steak was amazing; it has a spice rub and is possibly marinated. I don't know what they do to it, but it blows my mind! Everything else was great too, my only complaint is that they don't serve clarified butter with the seafood. When butter is not clarified, it is so fatty that it becomes much too rich to enjoy with the seafood. In any case, I was completely stuffed and I had to take half of my meal home. I was served a free slice of ice cream cake for my birthday dessert, complete with a celebratory sparkler and thankfully without an embarrassing staff rendition of 'happy birthday'. My Boathouse dinner made my birthday evening special!
Food: Had the seafood platter for two which was really good but if it were really for 2, why do they only give you 3 prawns instead of 4? Crab and salmon that came with dish was also very good. The dish was good for the two of us since I had already eaten just a few hours prior but if I hadn't, I'm quite sure it wouldn't have been enough for two people even though it was supposed to be portioned that way. Wanted to try the calamari but knew we wouldn't be able to finish it and an entree but will def. go back to try it out cuz it looked really yummy.
Service: Have never been to this location so I didn't know that the patio had a different entrance so I just went in through the front. No one helped us for a good 5-10 min which would have been ok for if the server hadn't been just a few feet away chatting with his friends so that just really irritated the hell out of me. When he finally noticed us, we decided we wanted to sit on the patio since it was such a nice day out and we were directed to another line (rising level of irritation since we had already waited...). Thankfully there was table avail. for 2 ready at the moment or else I would have left. Server was amazing which rescued the service rating.
Ambiance: Great patio but really needs to add more bathrooms/bathroom stalls for patio dwellers. Bathroom was atrocious - get it cleaned for god's sakes!!!
Overall: Will def. return if I can stand to take another hit on my wallet.
Me and some friends stopped here for a drink and "Appy Hour". The appetizers were all more expensive than the advertisement led us to believe. And though I'll admit that the yam fries and curry ketchup were delicious, the apps were smaller than I expected. We received a receipt with an invitation to do an online survey. We did the survey, but never returned to use our $10-off reward. It still didn't make the prices worth it. Denman and Davie both have so many more restaurants to choose from.
A friend and I ate at the Boathouse on August 10th, and we were both very impressed. When we arrived we were seated quickly on the deck overlooking English Bay. Our server quickly came by and took our drink orders. When the drinks were brought, we asked for a suggestion for a starter. We were told that the bucket of peel and eat shrimp was a good choice while we decided on dinner.
For dinner I ordered the 10oz sirloin steak, and my friend ordered the sirloin and king crab. Both were cooked to perfection and very tasty. I had heard from friends that the steak and seafood were amazing here, and the kitchen did not disappoint!
The view from the deck, the great service and the excellent food at this restaurant made for a great way to finish the day in Vancouver. I would recommend this restaurant to anyone.
I was here for lunch Sept. 25/09, we opted to sit on the patio, the day was warm and sunny so the view was fantastic. The food was the same as the other Boathouse locations, I always enjoy the coconut shrimp...Mmmmm
The service thought was atrocious, it took forever for our orders to be taken, and our server only came by once, she didn't refill our beverages - even when asked twice she finally brought them after we finished eating!
One server doesn't dampen my opinion of the Boathouse, I still enjoyed the food and ambiance.
I have come to this place on 4 different occasions and I have loved it each time. It's usually busy but overall I've always had solid service. The food is fresh and tasty. I highly recommend it to all of you and as a note the miso covered hallibut is out of this world. The fresh oysters are awesome too. Don't hesitate this place is solid.
We were looking for a place to grab some oysters on a sunny afternoon, other oyster bars were either closed for the afternoon or full. My girl friend figured the boathouse would have some - I was a bit hesitant since the boathouse wasn't my first choice but was I ever surprised!
As soon as you walk in there is a big sign telling you of their 3-6pm Happy Hour in the bar. At the very top was "Buck a Shuck" and literally each oyster variety was $1! They also had a few skewers and other seafood type pub food; it was awesome! Their oysters of the day were Kusshi, Royal Miyagi and Malpec - so it was great that we had variety and not just some generic oyster from bc.
Between the two of us girls we had 24 oysters and 2 beef satay plates and a few cesars. When we walked through the door we asked the hostess about the appy hour deal, since we were all about the oyster deal she asked us if we wanted to sit on the patio; the annoying part was the the deal only applied in the bar so she obviously didn't put two and two together offering us the patio. She sat us upstairs, we were greeted by a server and were told that we had to go back downstairs, that was a little annoying but no big deal.
The service was good, we had the bartender who was tending tables and doing the bar thing; so it was a bit slow; we had to grab his attention when we wanted to order but he didn't seem to mind, neither did we.
I will be back for sure and was really happy and surprised that the boathouse was offering something like this. Who knew!
came here during the week with friends to try the 3 course lobsterfest offer that they are currently promoting... $25 per person and that is one of the best deals you can possibly get anywhere in this city.
i started with the lobster bisque which was fabulous... broth was packed with flavor, not too salty with just the right balance. for my main, i ordered the lobster stuffed salmon which was just as delicious. salmon was not dry and cooked with just the right flavor! lastly, the mud pie was yummy.. i thought it was going to be a chocolate cake but it turned out to be a coffee one which did not negatively affect the dessert portion.
our waitress was friendly and polite to us.. she did come around to ask how our meal was but other than, she didnt return to fill our glasses with water which stayed empty for the rest of the evening til we asked for the bill.
in terms of value for this particular offer, all i can say is that it cant be beaten. there is one note that i would like to make: its hardly a lobsterfest at all, your dishes are not loaded with lobster as the term lobsterfest might imply so the advertising on their part is misleading. but again, most advertisements are.
very relaxed atmosphere on the second floor which overlooks english bay.. i could see how it would be beautiful environment to dine in during the summer inside the restaurant and outside on the patio.
i would certainly come back here if given the opportunity. my overall experience was great here so that leaves me no reason to not want to return.
Had lunch there recently and tried the Wild Salmon Burger. Blah. Had a Ceasar to drink. Yuck.
The prices do not warrant the quality of food. It's like churned out junk. My companion had a Ceasar Salad with chicken and it looked dismal.
We both had Ceasars to drink and they tasted like they had no vodka and used some cheap, generic Clamato juice.
The service was minimal even though the restaurant was not busy.
The decor is reminiscent of a tacky bar.
I miss the good old days when it was the English Bay Cafe...
Boathouse - Denman Street - English Bay
Every time I go to English bay I pass by the boathouse. I have always wanted to go but never had the opportunity. Finally it came when deciding where to go on a awesome Vancouver sunny day that is close to the beach.�
My friends and I sat upstairs in their patio. Our server was awesome. She was very personable and after chatting with you, you knew that she would take care of you. All of us opted to get something seafood. For drinks I ordered sangria. Little disappointed by it cause it wasn't what I was expecting. It tasted watered down than I normally have my sangrias. Order one and let me know what you think. Maybe it is just me.
Ahi tuna, salmon burger and seafood platter for two was what we ordered. The seafood platter was okay. I didn't expect much but overall the seafood was good and fresh. The salmon was little dry that I ended up drizzling quite a bit of lemon juice on it. They were able to substitute potatoes for grilled vegetables so if you are concerned about carbohydrates, then this an option for you. We ended up getting both potatoes and vegetables cause they mixed up our orders in the kitchen. The server was great at correcting the problem with a good positive attitude.
The best thing about my experience at the Boathouse is the patio and it is perfect for drinking beer / glass of wine soaking in the sun while looking over at English Bay.
The covered/heated year-round patio overlooking English Bay can't be beat. Unless of course, you're talking about the halibut & chips they serve - the best I've had north of Steveston.
And they do a pretty damn fine mohito too!
| 1. | Kitsilano Beach (1.6 km) |  |
| 2. | Richmond (10.6 km) |  |
| 3. | Horseshoe Bay (13.9 km) | |
| 4. | Quayside (19.1 km) | |
| 5. | Port Moody (21.1 km) | |
| 6. | White Rock (38.1 km) | |
| 1. | Cactus Club Cafe (47 m) | |
| 2. | Milestone's Grill & Bar (84 m) | |
| 3. | Calling Public House, The (99 m) | |
| 4. | Ginger Garlic Cuisine of India (106 m) | |
| 5. | Tim Hortons (115 m) | |
| 6. | Starbucks (115 m) | |
| 7. | Bayside Lounge (125 m) |  |
| 8. | Checkers Bar & Grill (125 m) |  |
| 9. | Bella Pizza (129 m) | |
| 10. | Barefoot Kitchen (134 m) | |
