A few weeks ago I was downtown Vancouver and I visited Dunn’s Famous, a restaurant known for serving smoked meat sandwiches.
Through some poor choices on my part, I was not overwhelmed by my first experience at Dunn’s Famous so I promised myself I would return and try more of the menu items. Yesterday was the day.
We started with a $5 order of fried pickles. Dill pickles, battered and deep fried. I’ve had deep fried pickles before and been quite pleased with them, but these…awesome. Small pickles cut into wedges before being battered and fried. Love them.
We also had an order of Dunn’s Egg Rolls for $6. There are three egg rolls per order; someone snuck one out of the dish before the camera could eat.
Filled with chopped smoked meat, their signature coleslaw (which was very much to our parties liking!), a little ginger and cilantro, the egg rolls were a hit with our party. Big enough to be a good starter item on their own, I would definitely order the egg rolls again.
In the name of journalistic integrity, I felt compelled to also order a poutine. The Dunn’s Poutine for $13 comes with barbecue gravy and chopped smoked meat. And of course, cheese curds.
The kitchen staff at Dunn’s Famous are not shy about adding the chopped smoked meat to the poutine. I really enjoyed the poutine but not everyone in our group thought the gravy was as good as I did. I would definitely order it again.
For mains, I had what the menu says is “The Best Reuben in the City”. I added a $3 side of onion rings – for your benefit. So was it the best Reuben in the City?
Well, it is definitely the best Reuben I have ever had in this city. The only other one I had that was remotely close to the goodness of this one was from the Butcher and Bollocks, another downtown location. I have heard that there is a good one at the Nosherie – there’s another good reason for me to go back downtown.
The Reuben is a triple-decker sandwich on very dark rye bread with great tasting sauerkraut, swiss cheese and a healthy drizzle of Thousand Island dressing.
Oooey-gooey goodness. Loved it. And I took half of it home.
One of my lunch dates chooses to eat gluten free so the $14 Dunn’s Double Down was a perfect choice. A similar stack of smoked meat, sauerkraut and Swiss cheese sandwiched between two potato latkes.
Although my picture does not do it justice, this was another lunch hit. And we really loved the coleslaw.
My other lunch mate had the Coffee Brined Roast Beef sandwich which comes on a ciabatta. There is also lettuce, tomato, and cheddar cheese with horse radish aioli. Honestly, the roast beef in the sandwich was (dare I say it?) better than the roast beef my mom makes. Full of coffee flavour and ultra tender.
So the bottom line? Dunn’s Famous is awesome. Basically everything we ordered was great to awesome. I will definitely return to Dunn’s Famous and have no hesitation in recommending them.
Dunn’s Famous is located at 827 Seymour Street in Vancouver.