Best Japanese Fine Dining: Tojo's

Thousands of rainbow rolls later, Hidekazu Tojo completed his dream restaurant this year in sexy, soaring new surroundings that manage to be both buzzy and peaceful. “Tojo’s [Gold] is where the city’s longest sushi and sake counters raise—what else—the bar.” With ever-growing competition in this category, Tojo still runs the best all-round Japanese restaurant, famous for sushi but equally praised for kitchen dishes, now in a room open to the stars and civilian diners. The strong contingent of Japanese ex-pats and tourists says it all at Yoshi (Silver), where the long knives prepare sushi and cooked meals that gently placate even the toughest critics, and the patio facing Stanley Park is an added summertime bonus, as is the beer jello (trust us). This is a restaurant where ponying up for a kaiseki meal is totally worth it. West Vancouver’s Zen (Bronze) promotes sushi surprises, like the seafood crepe roll, salmon tango maki and the isobe age, nori-wrapped tuna cooked like tempura. Yami Yamagishi of En (Honourable Mention) continues to blaze trails in a new room on West 10th that suits his inventive, impeccable style. Follow sushi with Italian influenced dishes that the chef has made his own—aburi salmon and miso beef borrow from carpaccio. With a menu as eclectic and entertaining as the décor, the endearing Octopus’ Garden (Honourable Mention) mixes whimsy and a rigorous technique in dishes of “fish and chips” (halibut tempura and yam fries), the exciting green and red dragon roll, the mango and yellowfin Yellow Submarine, and the fanciful Mr. Beans.

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