Every Thursday to Sunday evening, the wait staff at the Ugly Duckling Dining & Provisions restaurant carefully set knives and forks on chopstick rests at each table.
Proprietor and chef Corbin Mathany incorporates Chinese ingredients and techniques in almost every dish.The tasting menu includes dumplings, Chinese buns and steamed custards. The bill arrives pinned to a postcard of Victoria’s Chinatown in 1898, depicting children celebrating Lunar New Year.Developer Robert Fung, whose company, The Salient Group, is renovating two city blocks in Chinatown, insisted on the inclusion of the homages for businesses looking to locate there.
One example, fusion gastropub The Darkside, officially opened in January and features a mix of West Coast and Asian cuisine in a casual bar atmosphere.Others, like tapas wine bar La Boqueria and boutique doughnut shop Mello, opened in Chinatown a few years earlier, each adding to the neighbourhood’s new identity, Eng said.