When the team at 75 West Coast Grill invited us for a dinner tasting, we were so excited! This restaurant located at the Richmond Airport Mariott Hotel is formerly known as American Grill. This year, it went through major renovations to fit better with west coast lifestyle and themes. Gone were the leather sizes and heavy wood tables. Instead, plush seating and modern marble tables replaced the old decor. Guests were encouraged to linger and enjoy themselves in this bright, airy space. Despite these changes, I’m glad to see that they kept the open-kitchen concept and we got to watch the chefs at work.
THE DRINK
The weather was warming up and our server recommended us a lemonade for drinks. It was the perfect summer drink! Our lemonade was not overly sweet but packed that tanginess that a good lemonade requires. It was served in these tall, sleek glasses and we felt the presentation was nice.
THE APPETIZERS
We have a great weakness for calamari. Our criteria for a good plate of calamari: has to have nicely battered exterior with a soft, chewy inside. We’re happy to report that this calamari delivered. The batter was light yet held a nice crisp. There was a sweet and sour sauce on the calamari that elevated the dish yet didn’t make it soggy. We noticed all the nice little touches like the caramelized onions.
Crab cakes are something we tend to never order. I guess it’s because we’re worried that restaurants will add a ton of filler ingredients like potato or shrimp. 75 West’s crab cakes were filled to the brim with crab. The little filler vegetables were bell peppers to add a little extra crispiness and flavour. We were very impressed with the chunks of crab in each mouthful.
THE MAIN COURSES
We chose the rack of lamb to start off with. We were nervous about choosing this because some restaurants don’t know how to cook lamb and it comes out tough and dry. The lamb from here though, we couldn’t stop marvelling at how tender and juicy it was. We asked for it to be done medium rare and the chefs delivered. As you can see, the plating was also excellent. I know we ripped on veggies earlier up in the post but we scarfed down the veggies on this plate. They were drizzled with olive oil and we kept dunking them with the gravy because they were so delicious.
The lamb absolutely stole the show. The flavours were perfect and we had to flag our server down to see where the lamb was sourced from. She said they recently changed suppliers and now it comes from a farm in New Zealand. If you come to 75 West, you absolutely must try the lamb as we’ve never been anywhere else in Vancouver that has done it better.
The salmon was the last thing we tried. The plating for this dish was so colorful! We loved how the chef chose to use pomegranate seeds because not only did it make the dish prettier, it added wonderful flavors to the dish. What an innovative approach! The salmon skin was nicely crisped and the salmon was so tender. The potato purée was surpassingly tasty considering it’s…potatoes.
There was no room left in our tummies for dessert after this meal! We lingered a bit after our meal just chatting and our server was in no rush to hurry us out the door. She was always ready to answer our questions but gave us the privacy to enjoy our meal without hovering. We will definitely be back here and hope you will check 75 West Coast Grill out too!
