No. 23: Maenam

1938 WEST 4TH AVENUE, VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA
MAENAM.CA
604-730-5579

CHEF ANGUS AN has an almost impossibly busy workload. He just added Sen Pad Thai on Granville Island to his burgeoning group of casual eateries—which already included Freebird Chicken Shack and Longtail Kitchen in New Westminster and his Chinatown noodle shop Fat Mao.

All the same, Maenam has not missed a beat. For that An can thank his wife and business partner, Bangkok-born Kate Auewattanakorn, who rules the roost at their modern Thai flagship in Kitsilano. The couple met in London at David Thompson’s Nahm, the first Thai restaurant in the world to earn a Michelin star. An, a classically trained French chef, worked in the kitchen there; she ran the front of the house. Their Maenam collaboration was an instant hit when it opened in 2009. It reinvented Thai dining with its chic decor, polished service, carefully crafted cocktails and revelatory wine pairings.

Recently, the à la carte choices have been trimmed to place more emphasis on the six-course chef’s menu, which roams Thailand’s diverse regional cuisines, embraces local ingredients as much as possible and transcends classic recipes with innovative twists (think Dungeness crab cupcakes and Northern Thai larb-spiced albacore tuna tartare). Whole fish and crab are available with one day’s notice. From crispy sidestripe prawns caramelized in palm sugar to locally foraged matsutake mushrooms married with Thai holy basil in hot-and-sour clam soup, the cooking is always refined, beautifully presented and uncompromisingly bold.

HOURS

Lunch
Tuesday to Saturday
12:00 PM until 2:00 PM

Dinner
Monday to Sunday
5:00 PM until 10:00 PM

Photos: Courtesy of Maenam

No. 23: Maenam

No. 1: Alo

No. 2: Toqué!

No. 3: Joe Beef