Vancouver Downtown $5 Lunch Special Reviews

This post will be updated over the next month as I try to find all the $5 or less lunches in the rectangle bound by Robson, Denman, Davie, and Granville. Several places that have a lunch for $5 or less before any taxes will receive a visit from me.

First, this isn't a restaurant, but you can't beat the bentos at Kombiniya on Robson between Bute and Jervis. They're not hot, but they are probably the best value for your dollar on Robson. It's a bit of a secret from white people who probably avoid it for the almost exclusively Japanese writing everywhere. Even the name, "kombiniya" is Japanese--though it is actually Japelish. "kombini" is an abbreviation of the English word "convenience" and "ya" is a Japanese ending meaning "store". So it is a sort of Mom & Pop convenience store. I did see one other whitey in there--maybe she has the same advantage I have--namely having spent time in Japan and having the immunity to being intimidated by Japanese writing.

December 28, 2007:
Robson Teriyaki in the food court of Robson Market (Robson & Cardero)
Beef Teriyaki Lunch Special. $4.65 (4.95 w. tax). 3/5 stars
This dish was OK, but not great. The sauce could have been a tad zestier but it wasn't bad. There was a smattering of broccoli and carrot with some mushrooms in the meat. The grain was half rice and half noodle. The amount of beef was good. Cheap food court atmosphere.

January 2, 2008:
Falafel Town on Granville at Nelson
Beef Donair ($4.99) 3/5 stars
OK, I went at a bad time. It was the day's first beef sliced off the cone of beef on the gyro cooker and it was a thin cone, so undoubtedly left over from 2007. Instead of oozing yummy looking juices (like the chicken stack), it looked like a dry, hard, burnt rod of nondescript meat. Oh well. Next time I know better. I'm not sure if a donair is different than a gyro, but I was a bit surprized when instead of wrapping the ingredients in a flat bread style pita, the ingredients were stuffed into a pocket style pita opened up. There were 4 sauces--tzatziki, hot sauce, hummous, and ?. The veggies were lettuce, onion, tomato, and green pepper. It wasn't too bad, but not great. Maybe I'll try them again when the beef looks a little more appetizing. Another thing to consider is that they have a falafel donair for a mere $3.99 which could have tasted even better than the ideally prepared beef one. update: 6 hours later and I'm still not hungry. I guess my stomach acids are still busy trying to dissolve those veritable beef jerky strips. That's actually a plus.

January 3, 2008:
Hot Dog Stand by Blenz at Burrard & Robson 4/5 stars
I tried to order a $5 sausage (jumbo beef, or beef/chicken jalapeno & cheese), but they were already sold out at 1:30-ish. So I just got the standard $4 hot dog. It was very tasty with a mound of saurkraut and a pump each of the ketchup and mustard. The biggest problem, though, is the lack of a place to sit and enjoy the sausage.

January 4, 2008:
Panago at Denman between Nelson and Barclay 5/5 stars
They have a $5 pizza and soft drink deal ($5.30 with tax). It turns out it would be a quarter cheaper if you left off the soft drink. I had the Panago Classic with pepperoni, green peppers, olives, Canadian bacon, and onion. It was, of course, yummy. The crust was good, too. Definitely a good way to use the $5. The only down side was when I ordered a rot beer, I asked if it was sugar free and the clerk said yes. I opened it without looking. So I had to pour most of it down the sewer (let the fish have the high fructose corn syrup). Other than that, a nice way to spend $5 for lunch. The seating is at the window, so you can watch the people walking on Denman, too.

January 7, 2008:
One Saigon at Nelson and Hornby 4/5 stars
OK, I went a little over the $5 limit, but I could have stayed within it. (It's just that I had just done hot yoga and was really hungry.) They have baguettes for $3.50 and salad rolls for $2.50. I had a chicken baguette and shrimp salad roll. Both were absolutely yummy. Easily the freshest and tastiest $5 lunch I had since I started. I only take off a point because there wasn't enough. The baguette had bits of chicken, lettuce, and carrot. The salad roll had noodles, shrimps, and was served with a peanut sauce. I'll go there again.

January 8, 2008:
Grove Inn Restaurant on Denman south of Nelson 3/5 stars
This place has 2 menus--one with American food and one with Japanese food. The Japanese food looked more appetizing, but there wasn't a $5 option. I got a hamburger with fries for $4.95. This is actually a cheddar cheese burger. While the cheese wasn't completely melted, the burger itself was OK. It came with what appeared to be salsa, sort of anemic looking tomatoes, and some shredded lettuce fairly brown on the edges. The tables all have a bottle of ketchup but no mustard. The fries were OK--I've had better and I've had worse. I left feeling that this hamburger would be sitting in my stomach for a while and would fight off the hunger for quite a while. So far (3 hours later) it seems that way. They also had CNN on their large TV. But no sound and no subtitles.

January 9, 2008:
Pacific Wok on Davie on Davie between Thurlow and Bute 2/5 stars
I got a sesame chicken and fried rice plate for $4.75 ($4.99 with tax). They advertise No MSG which means that the food will not be as tasty as it looks. And it wasn't. I went at 11:30 and they only had about 3 options for a meat to go with the rice. Maybe later they put more out. Anyway, there was too much rice--I don't need all those carbohydrates. I doubt I'd go again, but it was a passable experience.