Dining on the Cheap

Four Great Restaurants That Won’t Break the Bank

BY LINDSAY WICKSTROM
PHOTOS MICHELLE DOUCETTE

Dining out can be expensive these days, but you don’t have to set up a savings account to afford a fantastic dining experience. Plenty of restaurants serve quality fare for a fair price, including these four from this year’s 50 Best Places to Eat.

VERANO FOOD PURVEYORS

Verano Food Purveyors is a Mexican-Venezuelan restaurant serving the downtown lunch crowd. Owners Eduardo Jaber and Adriana Gutierrez hail from Mexico and Venezuela, respectively.

Initially serving Western lunch fare with some Latin food specials, their catering service paid most of the bills until office workers started working from home during the pandemic. The shift expedited a decision to specialize solely in Mexican and Venezuelan food, which has turned out very well for Verano (which means “summer” in Spanish).

While tacos are the best-selling (in virtue of being the most familiar) items on the menu, Verano also makes arepas (Venezuelan corn flour patties sandwiched around tasty fillings) and empanadas (stuffed pastries that are both Mexican and Venezuelan), with options including braised beef, braised pork, chicken tinga, cheesy mushrooms, and black beans. They also do breakfast tacos, which are my favourite.

Most of the menu is gluten-free since the tortillas, arepas and empanadas all use corn flour. Of particular interest is the patacon, a sandwich unlike any other in Halifax, which incorporates fried plantain slices instead of bread. And if your appetite is hearty and you want a bit of everything, the pabellon (the national dish of Venezuela) is a rice bowl heaped with braised beef, fried plantains, queso, black beans, and fried wedges of arepa. It is customizable, so you can switch up your protein and add avocado or a fried egg. At $23, it is the most expensive item on the menu.

Verano has the characteristic warmth and familiarity of a family-run restaurant; everything is made with love. The kitchen is so tiny that Jaber has to make everything from scratch daily and even insists on making his tortillas. This dedication is why the food at Verano is so vibrant and fresh. Jaber is passionate about balancing the flavours and textures of his limited arsenal of ingredients to make exquisite yet humble dishes.

Jaber and Gutierrez have also started a popsicle business, making popsicles from natural blended fruit and selling them from tricycles around the city. Of course, you can also pick them up at Verano, which I recommend. The watermelon pop I tried was the most refreshing thing I’ve put in my mouth.

Remember that Verano still caters to the lunch crowd, operating Monday to Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. So you will have to make a special weekday trip if you don’t already live or work nearby and want to experience some of the best Latin food in the city. Trust me: it’s worth it.

KOFUKU JAPANESE & THAI

Chef Philip Peng started his culinary career in Guangzhou, China, where, at 22, he became the executive chef of a famous 5-star hotel. In 2007, he chased his dreams to Canada, where he met his wife, Amanda, working in a Chinese-Canadian restaurant.

Chef Peng wanted to bring so much more to the table than chicken balls and fried rice, so in 2021, he opened Kofuku (with Amanda, who runs the front-of-house), deciding to specialize in Japanese and Thai food, a combination of cuisines which permits him more creativity.

He also designed, built and renovated the restaurant himself, which used to be Mary’s Place on Robie Street. It is a clean and cozy space with Japanese-inspired decor.

He has the same hands-on approach to his food, which he crafts from scratch with attention to detail. The menu proudly states: “At Kofuku, we are passionate about food. Everything we cook is homemade, including sauces. We use fresh local produce and cook on order”.

The Thai menu has the usual suspects, like hot and sour soup, cashew chicken, and pad Thai, but also the Canadian Chinese classics that have nudged their way onto the menu, like ginger beef, lemon chicken, and Singapore noodles. But more intriguing are the elevated touches on the menu, like curries with duck breast and bone-in lamb. Whereas many Thai dishes in the Maritimes lean on sweetness, Chef Peng’s sauces have a much better balance of salty, sweet, spicy, sour and bitter: the pillars of Thai cuisine.

Peng’s Japanese menu has a similar flare, with elegant dishes like torched sashimi drizzled with truffle oil and house Japanese sauce, showcasing his love of play rather than abiding by the traditional script. While there are only four options for basic sashimi, you’ll find six vegetarian maki options, 13 fusion rolls drizzled in various house sauces, and a liberal use of torching and cheese (torched salmon nigiri with cheese, anyone?).

Ramen, poke bowls, and a premium sake list round out the menu. Don’t forget the house-made dumplings.

**Tacos, Fish N Chips, Seafood Chowder**

EVAN’S FRESH SEAFOOD

Evan’s Fresh Seafood started as a farmers market stall operated by Evan d'Entremont, a long-time fisherman with a boat and fish processing plant in Pubnico. With the help of his son-in-law, Oussama Ait Oumenni, he made the unusual decision in 2008 to sell his fresh seafood directly to the public. The business slowly grew, and Evan’s eventually took up a permanent space at the Alderney Farmers Market.

d'Entrement’s daughter, Joline, and her husband took on responsibility for a restaurant alongside the fresh fish counter so that customers could enjoy cooked seafood dishes. The family-run business knows which boats are landing and what is available, so the quality of their seafood is bar none. Their moist and delicate haddock, transported ice cold from the dock to the restaurant, exemplifies this freshness. d'Entrement is serious about icy cold transportation and storage and is even building a plant to make and sell ice to other fishermen.

Without hesitation, Evan’s fish and chips are the best in Halifax, if not the province. Every component is perfectly executed, from the super fresh haddock, fresh-cut fries, and house-made tartar sauce (made with zucchini relish and grainy Dijon) to the batter encasing the delicate fish. You may be surprised to learn that the fish and chips are gluten-free, as they have partnered with Schoolhouse Gluten-Free Bakery (neighbours at the Alderney Market), who provide bread crumbs to Evan’s. The result is a thin, crunchy, seasoned coating that perfectly complements the fish. Celiacs rejoice: Their chocolate and carrot cakes are also gluten-free.

The chowder is by no means gourmet, but still some of the best tasting in the city. It is very traditional, handed down from d’Entrement’s mother, featuring a light broth, some potatoes and lots of fish, scallops, and lobster.

But the Acadian roots of the food are most illuminated by the lobster poutine, which features Acadian-style creamed lobster on top of French fries and shredded cheese. (They also offer traditional poutine with gravy and curds but insist that the shredded cheese is better suited to the creamy lobster).

Fish tacos may not be authentic Maritime grub. Still, Evan’s does a proper nod to the Baja style with house-made salsa and guacamole, spicy mayo, shredded cabbage, and cilantro, going so far as to make their flour tortillas in-house.

Another less traditional dish for this region is the jambalaya (though it does tie into the menu via the Acadian-Cajun connection). It’s got local haddock and shrimp, chorizo, and mussels in a spicy house marinara sauce and has even earned the approval of visiting Louisianans.

You order at the counter, but the friendly staff delivers the food to your table, which happily has one of the best harbour views of Halifax. Evan’s is no ordinary deep-fried fish shack, nor is this haute cuisine: this is honest seafood par excellence.

I LOVE PHO

Halifax isn’t exactly known for its Vietnamese food, but sitting unassumingly on the Bedford Highway is I Love Pho. Since 2014, this restaurant has quietly served some of Halifax's best and most authentic Vietnamese food.

Though pho (pronounced fuh) soup is their namesake, they have quite a robust menu with a roster of soups, rice dishes, and Chinese and Thai dishes. But I’m impressed to see hard-to-find (in Halifax) items like Sate Pho and Banh Xeo (Vietnamese crepes) and dishes I’ve never encountered, like oxtail pho.

I’m always looking for a stellar cold-cut banh mi. For some reason, Vietnamese subs are far from ubiquitous street food in Halifax, and the comforting cold-cut version is even harder to track down.

To my delight, I Love Pho has excellent banh mi. They use baguettes from Arthur’s Market that encapsulate the light airiness and crunch you expect from a proper banh mi. They offer three varieties: sate beef, Vietnamese sausage, and my beloved cold cut. The result is a respectable sub with thick slices of Vietnamese cold cuts, topped with liver pate, pickled carrots and daikon, cucumber and cilantro. If you’re looking for a quick lunch, you can get a half-size banh mi with a Vietnamese coffee for $12.95. Or do as I did and split a whole sub ($14.99) as an appetizer.

I was told the bun bo hue (pronounced boon bo ‘way) is the ticket, and it did not disappoint. The name translates to noodles with beef from Hue (a city in central Vietnam). Both pho and bun bo hue are famous noodle soups from Vietnam, but bun bo hue is saltier and spicier, flavoured with lemongrass, fermented shrimp paste, and chilli oil. The noodles, thicker and rounder than pho, are topped with beef brisket, Vietnamese sausage, and pork hocks (traditionally, the dish includes cubes of congealed pork blood, but not at I Love Pho). Both soups come with a plate of bean sprouts, lime wedges, Thai basil, and chiles to add to your bowl.

Sitting on a sunny patio overlooking the Bedford Basin, I thoroughly enjoyed this hearty, flavourful soup. There are lots of incredible new restaurants popping up on the Bedford Highway, but I Love Pho is not to be missed!

Dining on the Cheap