Only two people have ever finished the Party Boat in under 40 minutes, and both of them eat competitively for a living.
French Creek Pub, the Parksville marina pub that built its reputation on that platter, opened a downtown Vancouver location in mid August at 101-1100 Burrard Street.
The unit is the one Burgoo left in May after 10 years in the corner of the Burrard Hotel.
Santanna Portman and her fiancé Marc Klijnsmit took over the original French Creek Pub in 2024, at a marina site that had already been running for 40 years before they signed.
They now operate three restaurants together, two on the Island and this one.
The Party Boat is the dish that paid for the expansion.
It runs $119, feeds four to eight people, and stacks battered cod and halibut with popcorn shrimp, garlic shrimp skewers, lobster rolls, calamari, onion rings, fries, coleslaw and house sauces.
“It has grown from our first year selling 39 boats to this year being on par to sell over 2000,” Portman says.
Attempt it alone inside 40 minutes and the boat is free, plus a champion T-shirt.
Two people have managed it, both professional eaters.
The downtown room is about 3,000 square feet with 85 seats, and a heated, dog-friendly patio of 25 more is pending approval.
Portman describes string lights, sparkling palm trees and a TV sightline from every seat, with staff in Hawaiian shirts.
The house slogan is “always on island time,” which is a strange thing to promise a block from St. Paul’s.
Downtown gets two things the Island location does not.
Breakfast runs daily from 9am, including an $18 classic plate and a devilled egg bar, which is a deliberate play for hotel guests and the hospital and Wall Centre crowd.
The other is a lineup of garlic bread bowl mac and cheese bombs starting around $23, topped in the case of the Mac Daddy with lobster tail, shrimp skewer and caviar.
Guests of the Burrard Hotel and the Sheraton get 10 percent off food with a room key, and a cheaper quick menu for on-duty first responders launches September 1.
Whether a fish bowl cocktail with candy fish in it plays the same on Burrard as it does at a marina is the open question.
The bet is that downtown has plenty of expensive rooms and not many loud ones.
French Creek Pub joins other recently opened Vancouver spots including Chef Hyve on Commercial Drive, Meros, and SUMU.
For more new and upcoming food spots in Metro Vancouver, take a peek at our tracker here, and subscribe to our weekly newsletter here.
Address: 101-1100 Burrard Street, Vancouver, BC (The Burrard Hotel, former Burgoo)
Google decides which local food news you see. Tell it you want Noms
One tap adds Noms Magazine as a preferred source. No signup, no email.