Give DOSANKO a break already!!!” was the comment that summed up the reaction when this Strathcona restaurant posted that it was closed again.
On September 22, a third fire shut Dosanko down again.
“Sorry we will be closed until further notice,” the family-run Japanese restaurant posted on Instagram.
The post says “the building next door had caught on fire and we had a large water damage in our building as well.”
Dosanko sits at 566 Powell Street in Strathcona, on the old Japantown stretch of Powell, and it’s run by husband and wife Nathan and Akiyo Lowey.
They opened it in July 2017, cooking yoshoku, the Japanese home-style food built on Western techniques, with Akiyo’s Hokkaido upbringing as the reference point.
Nathan is a Red Seal chef who came up cooking French and Italian food, including time at Campagnolo, while Akiyo ran front of house at Tojo’s before they went out on their own.
The opening menu leaned on omurice, tonkatsu, tempura and a chanchan-yaki salmon plate, and every dessert is still made in house, with a specials menu that changes weekly.
On July 17, 2022, the restaurant’s fifth anniversary, a fire broke out on the second floor of Dosanko’s building and flooded the dining room below.
Nobody was hurt, because the staff were out at a beach barbecue celebrating the anniversary.
Akiyo set up a GoFundMe to keep paying staff through what was supposed to be a couple of months of repairs.
Then on August 22, 2022, a three-alarm fire destroyed three century-old SRO buildings at Powell Street and Princess Avenue, displaced at least 40 residents, and pushed more water and smoke into Dosanko.
“Needless to say, things just got a little more complicated,” the restaurant wrote at the time.
It stayed closed for several months, and the neighbourhood helped raise $10,000 for the staff while it did.
One of the buildings lost in that 2022 fire was the Princess Rooms on the corner, which only started moving its previous tenants back in over the last few months.
The recent September 22 fire was in the building right next to it.
That really sucks, for the tenants who just got home and for a restaurant that had finally put both of its 2022 fires behind it.
Dosanko hasn’t said how long this round of repairs will take, only that it will update as soon as possible.
The comments filled up fast with fellow Vancouver restaurants, from Torafuku to Chef’s Favourite to Shorba Bone Broth, all sending sympathy.
One commenter put it more bluntly: “Give DOSANKO a break already!!!”
If you’ve been meaning to try their omurice, follow their Instagram, because the reopening announcement will land there first.
Dosanko’s pause adds to a hard September for Vancouver dining rooms, one that has already taken Fable Kitchen in Kitsilano and Caffè Artigiano on Main Street, with Vegan Shoku in Kerrisdale closing its West 41st room next.
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Address: 566 Powell Street, Vancouver, BC V6A 1G9
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