There aren’t many Vancouver pubs which fit the description “legendary,” but very high on that short list is The Blarney Stone in Gastown, which has been welcoming locals and visitors alike with warm Irish-inspired hospitality since 1972.
The pandemic shutdown and slow return to normal gave the owners of The Blarney Stone a chance step back from the day-to-day challenges to focus on making sure the much beloved pub would come back better in every way. One of the key priorities was to give the food menu a complete overhaul to make it a match for the best pub food they had enjoyed during their travels around North America and overseas.
Working with long time Vancouver chef Karl Gregg, The Blarney Stone team spent months evolving and perfecting a top-to-bottom new menu which blended pub classics with delicious inspirations. In upping their food game, they changed their sourcing to use delicious local ingredients like grass-fed BC beef and Ocean Wise seafood and developed in-house recipes like scratch-made batters and sauces to showcase them in the best way.
So, the signature Fish Basket now features Ocean Wise cod wrapped in a house made Harp Lager batter for crispy perfection and the Dubliner Burger is built with a custom-ground blend of BC grass-fed beef and sharp Dubliner Irish cheddar. Lucky Nachos use house-fried tortillas as the basis for what might be the city’s biggest nacho plate, and the house wings come tossed in a Jameson Whisky Glaze.
“This new menu has been a long time coming and it’s been a labour of love for us,” said long time general manager and food veteran Brian Gobeil. “We wanted to be able to offer our guests the same sort of hearty, delicious food that we’ve enjoyed visiting pubs all over the world and we’re thrilled to launch the menu to all our regulars and out of town visitors.”
Speaking about the menu, Chef Gregg said: “the Blarney Stone team was wide open to the ideas I brought in around using local ingredients, expanding the range of share plates, and doing a lot more prep in-house. I think the quality of the food shows that it was worth the work.”
The Blarney Stone is open at 11am daily in the heart of historic Gastown and the full menu can be found online at blarneystone.ca.
