Charcoal Hand Rolls at Hello Nori, Park Royal

Flame-kissed aburi sushi by Burrard Inlet, where the salmon oshi arrives, gets photographed, and makes the table go silent.

Seventeen seats, one sitting, Edo-style nigiri piece by piece, and your phone face-down all night. Michelin-recommended and books out fast.

All-you-can-eat yakiniku where you grill prime beef together on a two-hour clock, and 13,000 reviewers agree it was worth the lineup.

The Broadway institution where chef Hidekazu Tojo, credited with inventing the California Roll, runs a legendary seasonal omakase counter.

Fukuoka-style tonkotsu you customize on a little order sheet, plus a queue that counts as your best first-date warmup.

A calm Newport Village sushi room with soft jazz and private curtained tables you can pull closed and slip your shoes off at.

West Broadway's papier-mache-and-neon sushi institution since 1983, with 50-plus rolls that have never once cared about tradition.

The Kitsilano sushi counter whose omakase regulars guard like state secrets, and whose uni and bluefin prove them right.

Twelve seats. Chef Satoshi Makise. Edomae nigiri shaped right in front of you, delivered with the quiet instruction to eat now.

Vikram Vij's legendary modern Indian room, where the wine-marinated lamb popsicles have been redefining romance since the '90s.

Climb the Robson staircase into a golden room where a six-foot wood grill has been perfuming everything since noon.

French technique and Gastown cobblestones, with an atrium, award-winning cocktails, and a bar that doesn't rush you out.

A dim, jazz-soaked 1960s Tokyo cafe in Chinatown, where tajarin with uni is just how dinner starts.

Peruvian-Japanese nikkei plates in a glass room facing Lions Gate Bridge, best appreciated the moment the sun hits Burrard Inlet.