Time Travel Alert: Chambar Is Offering a 20th Anniversary Tasting Menu at 2004 Prices

They say time travel isn’t possible… and yet, Chambar is daring us to try this spring, with an anniversary menu available at 2004 prices.

While the rest of us were spending 2004 jamming out to our mini-disc players, scalping tickets to Black Eyed Peas concerts and blogging about how The Notebook changed our lives, Nico Schuermans and Karri Green-Schuermans were opening the doors to a restaurant that would become an essential part of the culinary fabric of our city. Even international publications took note of this scrappy upstart, which brought excellently executed, Belgian-ish fare and an unpretentious cool factor to Gastown with a bang. (Bon Appetit once described the spot as “civilized debauchery.”)

Over two decades, Chambar quietly shaped the city’s food scene, with dozens of its alumni staff and chefs going on to start their own high-level rooms that in turn would teach the next generation of industry pros how to do it right. Tannis Ling (Bao Bei, Kissa Tanto, Meo) got her start there; so did Roger Collins (Calabash), Patrick Hennessy (Barbara), Paul Grunberg (Banda Volpi restaurant group) and Justin Tisdall (Juke Fried Chicken), to name a few… all told, a real murderers’ row of Vancouver Magazine Restaurant Award nominees.

In honour of making it to the ripe old age of 20—a rare feat for a restaurant in this city—Chambar is going back to its rooms with a special three-course table d’hote special, featuring dishes from the inaugural menu at a very-2004 price: just $45 per person.

The 20th Anniversary Nostalgia Menu will be available April 2 to 17, 2024, and offers the choice of dishes like grilled Ahi tuna with parsley and mint tabbouleh, cumin and smoked aubergine; a prawn-and-mussel bouillabaisse with tomato, saffron and charred orange; and chocolate mousse parfaits. It’s a blast from the past—a delicious one that makes us wish we’d spent more time back in 2004 appreciating this culinary stalwart. How many nights did we waste watching Shrek 2 when we could’ve been tucking into a perfect Belgian endive salad?!

Chambar has more anniversary plans in the works for this year—like a big Medieval Fest in July!—but it’s hard to justify looking to the future when the past is this delicious.

Chambar
568 Beatty Street
chambar.com