Dynasty Seafood Restaurant Finally Gets its Due

Claypot filled with large oysters and beef tendons

Last week Vancouver Magazine named Dynasty Seafood Restaurant as Restaurant of the Year, and last year was named Best Chinese Restaurant in Canada by the Chinese Restaurant Awards.

In 1992, the Cantonese restaurant originally in the West Broadway location was called East Ocean and then it changed hands in 2009 to become Dynasty Seafood Restaurant. 

Mini minced pork patties with lotus

For Vancouverites who have discerning taste, Dynasty is the one to beat, as each successive chef cooks up creative delicious dishes built from solid culinary foundations. And then there's the presentation: many years ago I remember as decoration a basket was woven out of stalks of green chives. 

Perhaps the only challenge about this restaurant is that it is hard to book a table, or the noise level in the dining room can get to raucous levels. 

We went here a few days after Dynasty was crowned the top restaurant in the city, and surprised to find they didn't have our reservation, but that they happened to have an extra table for us.

For dinner we didn't go too fancy, but some highlights were the claypot filled with gelatinous hot beef tendon paired with large oysters, succulent sauteed diced beef with eggplant, and mini pan-fried minced pork patties with lotus for added texture. 

While these dishes were delicious, they had quite a bit of MSG in them; I was quite thirsty afterwards!

Stir-fried diced beef with eggplant

It was quite the shock to see Dynasty FINALLY get its due from Vancouver Magazine... a long time ago for many years, the publication's perception of good Chinese food was Pink Pearl Chinese Seafood Restaurant, a place that seems frozen in time in the early 1980s and hasn't evolved much since.

We're glad to see Chinese cuisine finally get more praise from mainstream media. But there are many other great restaurants too other than Dynasty. 

Here's to hoping more Chinese places get recognised by the tastemakers who are beginning to learn what good Chinese food is!