Restaurants
A small fine-dining Thai room on the Steveston waterfront serving a set menu at fixed seatings, Wednesday through Sunday only. Reservations are essential, and there is a Thai afternoon tea service on weekends. Expect a long, formal, expensive meal.
Fine dining and Steveston are not words people usually put together, which makes a room like this one unusual before you have read anything about it. The village trades mostly in fish and chips, ice cream and a walk along the boardwalk. A formal evening is a different proposition and needs a different plan: an occasion rather than a drop-in, and a whole evening given over to it rather than an hour squeezed between other things.
The setting is the waterfront end of Bayview Street, where the village stops being shops and starts being water. That stretch reads better on a dark winter evening than it does in July, when the village is full and finding somewhere to leave a car turns into a competition. Anyone driving in should solve that problem first and work backwards from it.
Thai cooking in Metro Vancouver mostly lives in casual rooms, strip mall storefronts and takeout counters, and it is very good in that register. A formal version of it is rare here, and rarer still on a working waterfront with the boats tied up a few hundred metres away. Restaurants that aim high in a village setting live or die on whether locals use them more than once a year, which is a harder test than anything a city center room faces. Read the restaurant's own site before making plans, because a room like this runs on a different rhythm from the rest of the village.
In the Steveston neighbourhood of Richmond.
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Other restaurants and nearby businesses in the Richmond directory.
Family-run Texas-style smokehouse near the far end of Bayview, turning out brisket, pulled pork, lamb shank and smoked chicken quarters. Portions are large and the lounge side pours beer and cocktails. A change of pace from Steveston's seafood.
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A small Steveston burger-and-beer room on No. 1 Road with seasonal local plates and a busy weekend brunch that runs on a ninety-minute seating limit. Reservations and the waitlist are handled online rather than by phone.
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A taphouse near No. 1 Road and Moncton with a deep BC beer list and a long wine selection. Comfort food, burgers, salads and shareables. Roomier and less touristy than the waterfront spots, which makes it a dependable evening option.
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Breakfast and brunch only, closing by early afternoon. The menu works Asian flavours into diner staples - ube lattes, challah French toast, breakfast ratatouille. No reservations are taken, so expect a wait on weekend mornings.
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A waterside eatery tucked behind the Bayview shops, best known for burgers and a brunch that runs all seven days and stretches to crab cake benedict, cabbage rolls, borscht and chowder. Casual and rustic, and easy to walk straight past.
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A small family-run Hawaiian spot in the Bayview block near the Steveston waterfront. Plate lunches, kalua pork and loco moco come out fast and cheap, with rice and mac salad on the side. Limited seating, so many orders head out to the boardwalk.
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