The Undeniable Greatness of The Patty Shop

If there was ever a time when we needed to be comforted by permanence, it’s now. And in the up and down world of the Vancouver food scene, it’s tough to get more permanent than The Patty Shop, opened by the McHardy family (patriarch Darryl is the Jamaican connection) on a sleepy block of McDonald Street in 1979, and producing the eponymous West Indian staple non-stop since then.

And while the price of a house in the now tony Arbutus neighbourhood has increased about 300-fold, a step inside The Patty Shop is like entering a time capsule, where a beef patty (mild, hot or curry) sets you back $2.57 (for local bigwigs, the chicken is $2.86). For that, you get a meat-filled pastry hand-made early that morning that works for lunch and nails the after-school snack. If you had to pick one culinary beacon that could help see you through these tough times, our vote lies right here.