We tried Joe Fortes for the first time last evening. Based on our experience, it will most likely be our last visit as well.
To be fair, we were a large party of eight. We arrived a little early for our 8PM reservation but were seated within 15 minutes of arrival. Our hostess guided up upstairs to a rather private area with a large banquette with was located just inside the door to the upper outside patio. We came to know the location very well as the evening was cool and the door opened with a chilly frequency that was enough to interrupt dinner at regular intervals. Someone came by after we were seated for about ten minutes and offered water for the table. After an additional 20 minutes, we still had not seen our server and were unable to even place our wine order. After sitting there with water and (thank goodness!) good company, we finally placed the wine order and 15 minutes after that, the wine arrived. Once each bottle was tasted and poured, we were left alone for an additional 20 minutes (it was well after 9PM and we’d been seated over an hour) and were hungry to the point of contemplating the plates as good roughage. One of our party got up and went in search of our server. After retrieving our apologetic server and placing our orders, we resumed chatting. Overall, while our server tried her best, she was at the mercy of the kitchen and the kitchen was apparently backed up with several large parties. We ended up receiving two dessert trays as an apologetic gesture and were out the door at about 11:30PM.
Onward to the food! I started with the beef Carpaccio. It was positively sublime, the beef perfectly seasoned and textured with a small mound of greens and shaved grana padano in the middle. It was dressed with crispy capers and a grainy mustard aioli – truly, the highlight of the meal.
My main course was Ahi tuna with a lemon emulsion and surf clam aioli. The tuna itself was very good, the texture and taste as expected from a sashimi-grade tuna. It was seared very rare and the lemon emulsion coated the outside. Honestly, the lemon emulsion did not have much taste and could have been omitted. The surf clam aioli had a nice flavor, but it completely coated the bottom of the plate and ended up overpowering the delicate flavor of the tuna. The two sides were both complete throwaways. The greens were quite bitter (and not in a good, foodie-type way) and the herbed potatoes quite honestly tasted like they came powdered from a box sitting in the pantry since 1985. I was hungry by the time our food finally arrived and I still couldn’t force myself to eat them.
When the two dessert trays arrived, we pounced on the mini molten chocolate cakes with cherry compote (delicious, one bite sated my chocolate craving) and the crème brulee. The brulee was the other star of the evening…Tahitian vanilla flavor shone through and the custard was incredibly light – amazing! I would have no problem dropping by for lunch (yep, Carpaccio and crème brulee, please!) but don’t need to go through this long ordeal for dinner when there are so many other alternatives in Vancouver.
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