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Go Fish
Address: 1505 West 1st Avenue
Tel: 604-730-5039

Hours:
vary by season

Bigger Fish to Fry

By Jason
Eat Vancouver Editor
Friday, November 11th, 2005

** (of four stars)

I expected a town like Vancouver to contain more destinations for decent fish and chips. I’m not exactly certain why I thought that, maybe it’s because the city is overrun with sushi restaurants and, hey, sushi is just one step removed from fish and chips, isn’t it? Maybe not, but the lack of places to get fish and chips is nonetheless troubling.

To meet this demand, Gord Martin and Ian Johansen opened up a damn decent fish and chips stand just off of Granville Island. For a beginner, finding this place isn’t shooting fish in a barrel. The address is really no help as it sits next to a harbor, hidden from view. What you want to do is come from the walkway just southwest of Granville Island, next to the culinary school and posh housing. Stick close to the waterfront and you will eventually get there.

The menu at Go Fish is short (as it should be), and in general, quite excellent. The Granville Island beer battered fish and chips are the star of the menu, and are what a newcomer should stick to. The fish is expertly fried to a golden brown with a crispy exterior surrounding fish so fresh in nearly melts in your mouth. A key, often overlooked, cog in fish and chip manufacturing is the oil. You’ve got to have clean oil, a fact that several other places around town seem to forget or simply not care about. Go Fish is pretty good about keeping clean oil in the fryer.

I recommend the halibut because it holds up a little better under the cooking conditions. It’s a sturdier fish, and the less firm cod nearly melts away. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but I believe a little more texture on the inside makes the interplay between crunchy and soft all the more enjoyable.

With your fish and chip meal you receive chips, of course, and the “pacific rim” cole slaw. It’s apparently in vogue to add sesame oil to dishes to give it the “pacific” flavor, and this is an instance in which I do not think it’s necessary. Cole slaw should be tangy and refreshing to counterbalance the oily fish and chips. Sesame oil bogs the flavors down, making the cole slaw nutty and sweet and not at all refreshing.

Besides fish and chips, Go Fish serves an excellent daily soup, as well as a variety of sandwiches. The sandwiches were thoughtfully developed, and all work quite well. My favorite is the grilled wild pacific salmon with shrimp mayo and Japanese style pickled cucumbers. My complaint, which holds for all the sandwiches, is that the bread to fish ratio is weighted heavily towards bread. It’s easy to lose the delicate flavor of the tuna in the albacore tuna sandwich and that of the oysters in the oyster po’ boy. That’s not to say the bread isn’t excellent, it is, there’s just too much of it. It’s not uncommon to see diners leaving a good deal of the bread behind, focusing on what lies between.

Overall, Go Fish is a welcome addition to the fish and chips scene in Vancouver.