Kitsilano sundries

See also our separate guide to Vancouver restaurants.

Our house is roughly equidistant between 3 shopping and provisioning hubs:

Jericho Village mall

About four blocks west of our house at the corner of 4th and Alma. Barely a mall. This is the closest place to find the basics.

• BC Liquor store – The government liquor stores aren’t the only places you can buy booze but everybody else has to markup the government price but something like 18%. That’s on top of the fact that wine is about 2 to three times more expensive here than it is in the US.
• Buy-Low isn’t much to look at but mostly lives up to its name and has all the basics, plus a not-bad assortment of organic produce.
• Cheese store: on the upper level, quite good.
• Hot Cuisine: on the Alma side of the mall, good for prefab meals

Fourth & Vine

The 2200-2300 block of West Fourth has a lot of what you need, including:

• Capers: the yupscale health food store meets gourmet shop meets local grocer. Very nice organic produce, excellent range of products; pricey but good quality and pretty much has all the basics.
• Duthie’s Books: next door from Caper’s, pretty much Vancouver’s lone remaining independent bookseller. Nice.
• Safeway: across from Capers, a full-service grocery store. Hasn’t been as nice as the Safeway at McDonald & Bway but is at the tail end of a renovation so we have hope.
• Shoppers Drug Mart: basic drug store, across from Safeway.
• Mums Gelato: kind of across from Shoppers/Capers. Excellent gelato. This isn’t a city for good ice cream (there’s no local equivalent to Double Rainbow) but there are lots of sources for great gelato. Mums is among the best.
• Seven Seas: across from Safeway; best fish market around. Expensive but excellent.
• Market Meats: next to Seven Seas. Great butcher, all free range meat, again, not cheap.
• Terra Breads: a little bit west of Seven Seas and Market Meats; excellent baked goods. RESIST the urge to go to Cobb Bread (next to Market Meats) and walk the rest of the way down the block. Terra is worth it. (If you are buying your bread at Capers, Ecco Il Pane bread is excellent too).

West Broadway

Wander along Broadway from MacDonald to Alma and you’ll find lots to eat, buy and do. Almost all our favourites are on the north side of the street, except where noted.

• Safeway: at the corner of Broadway and MacDonald is probably the best grocery store nearby but it doesn’t stack up next to the big American groceries.

MacDonald to Bayswater:

• A bunch of ok produce stores; not our favourites but quite fine.
• Solly’s Bagel’s: between MacDonald and Bayswater, north side; our vote for best bagels in town (and killer cinnamon rolls too). Others swear by Siegel’s (Cornwall and Cypress) but Solly’s bagels are denser.

Bayswater to Trutch:

• Shoppers Drug Mart: another branch of the Canadian chain.
• Calhoun’s is my office-away–from-home. 24 hour coffee shop with your basic range of sandwiches, salads, prefab meals and cookies. (I don’t recommend the cakes). Wireless internet access (pay per use).
• Produce store immediately next door to Calhoun’s has good produce, some organic, very very nice people and a surprising range of other grocery items.
• TravelBug is a very nice bookstore, very friendly, if you’re ready to plan your next trip already.
• Kidsbooks (Broadway and Balaclava) is just what the name suggests. Phenomenal.
• Parthenon (south side, opposite Kidsbooks) is our favourite of the 2 greek foodstores on this strip. Good for olives (their Sicilian olives are an out-of-body experience). Nice dips etc.

Balaclava to Trutch

• Young Brothers is an insane produce store on the south side of the street. Amazingly fresh, very inexpensive. Cash only. Nothing organic but a great variety of conventional produce. Our favourite non-organic produce store.

Trutch to Blenheim

• East is East is a great place for lunch. Very atmospheric, delicious Indian wraps and plates.

further west on Broadway

• Transylvania Bread (south side, west of Collingwood or Waterloo) has a good rep though we haven’t been there yet.
• Montri (on the north side, amost at Alma) is generally regarded as the best Thai restaurant in the city.

More shopping and eating

• Granville Island is the local marketplace; about a half hour walk or a 5 minute drive (east on 4th; pass Burrard and turn next left onto Fir, then next right (past drum shop) and left at next set of lights). It’s tucked under the Granville Street bridge so not hard to find. Huge range of craft shops, plus a huge huge food market with tons of produce, bakery, meats, cheeses etc etc. Check it out early in your time here because if you are the kind of folks who like market shopping you may LOVE it and want to do all your shopping here. There’s even a Kids Market full of potential presents for grandchildren.
• Les Amis du Fromage (1752 West 2nd, just on your way to Granville Island). Cheese people say it’s the best cheese store in the city. We’re not cheese people so I’ve never even been inside (blush).
• Meinhardt (Granville and 15th): the yuppie food store to end all yuppie food stores. Get your esoteric ingredients and imported French bonbons here. Really excellent prepared meals too. You can put together a great lunch from Picnic, their lunch counter next door.
• Sweet Obsession: on 16th just west of Trafalgar. Best cakes and treats in our neighbourhood. Really really amazing. Their restaurant (Trafalgar’s, at the corner of Trafalgar) has an excellent breakfast and brunch and good other meals too.
• Choices is right next door to Sweet Obsession; it’s the Capers alternative. Produce isn’t quite as nice as Capers; but they carry some non-health-food-store products.

More reading:

• Our friend Roland’s terrific VanEats guide to Vancouver dining includes a page on food shopping with some excellent tips.
• Vancouver Magazine has a good guide to dining out and another guide to shopping (more stuff than food).
• Food City Vancouver is a now somewhat out-of-date book. You’ll find it in our cookbook cupboard (above the microwave).