My wife and I have a simple rule: I am not allowed to try a restaurant without her that she wants to try. However the reverse doesn’t hold; she can try restaurants without me that I want to try. So she went with a friend to try Henry’s, a newish wine bar that is Michelin-recommended. She liked it enough that she returned, this time with me in tow.
On a Friday night, it is a bustling and fairly loud space. There is a small high table at the front that takes you a bit away from the crowd, but does subject you to the chill of the nearby front door. Our waitstaff was friendly, well-informed about the wines and food, and generally attentive. The wine selection by the glass had a nice variety, including some higher end options. The food ranged from fancy comfort food to more refined options.
Wines:
- 2021 Anthill Farms, Peugh vineyard - nice Russian River chardonnay, pleasantly oaky but very fruity and peachy as well.
- 2022 Alzinger, Ried hochstrasser, Federspiel, Wachau, gruner veltliner - lovely green apple and blossom, some minerality.
- 2019 Dominio de Bibei, Godello and Albariño, lapola, Ribeira Sacra - gently oaked and nutty and mineral.
- 2021 Dominio de Bibei, Mencia blend, Lacima, Ribeira Sacra - delightfully cherry, with almost no tannins and then raspberry at the end.
The smaller dishes are really quite small, closer to single bites. We tried Bubba’s hot fried chicken with mojo verde, pickled shallots, and lime to squeeze, pickled shallots - excellent frying, moist dark meat, tangy sauce with a nice kick.
Shrimp toast in sesame crust, lemongrass aïoli, hot mustard - supple coldwater shrimp, encased in buttery but not too big toast, complemented by a fragrant aioli.
Salt Spring mussels and clams in tom kha, mushrooms, activated charcoal, and 4 pillowy milk buns - a wonderful rich and complex broth and the milk buns were decadent, but 6 shellfish total seemed a bit miserly for $24.
Tostada, snow crab, persimmon, Oaxacan salsa, watermelon radish, various baby greens, and lime - sweet crab nicely balanced with a variety of textures and flavour angles.
Roasted delicata squash, apricot chimichurri, labneh dollops, pepitas, tarragon mojo verde, chunks of red pepper - one of the better dishes of the night, with subtle complexities.
Crown ravioli, polenta, king oyster, Parmesan, hazelnut, and mushroom sauce - loved by my wife; I thought good, but a little one-note.
Grilled steelhead trout, fregola (pasta like pearl couscous), lime gel, butter sauce, salsify chips - skin crisped, flesh raw and delicate in the middle, redolent with lime, a great dish.
Dessert wine:
2021 Straw Wine Mullineux, South Africa, chenin blanc, raisinated on straw - lovely, lots of honey notes.
Spiced carrot cake, pecan praline, sour cream ice cream, bourbon caramel sauce - both the ice cream and sauce had lots of tang, nicely balancing the sweetness of the cake and pecans.
S’mores: maple marshmallow, dark chocolate creme mousseline and German chocolate buttercream, housemade graham cracker - back to fancy fun for the finish.
