Arcana Food and Spirits — Restaurant in Vancouver

I came into Vancouver on a little vacation for myself to visit some family. I had heard about Arcana and needed to at least see it once, being a fan of occult things. Figured I’d make a night out of it and it did nit disappoint.

As soon as you walk in you get a feel for the atmosphere and get caught looking at the room. I almost forgot to talk to the hostess when she greeted us.

When we sat down, we ordered the ouija board (charcuterie) and a few cocktails. Cthulhu’s Tiki and The Empress. Cthulhu’s Tiki was served in an actual mug of Cthulhu which was awesome in of itself. The Empress was served with a tarot card and dry ice which gave it that ominous look which went with the aesthetic Arcana provides.

The ouija board… my god, the cheese… I say again… the cheese!!! There was a truffle cheese included which is very expensive itself. What a treat. Add in the different meats, other cheese, fresh jams, mustard, and crostinis. Unbelievable and well worth the price as a shareable appetizer.

By that point we were done our first round of cocktails and ordered the Devil (espresso martini) and the magician (fruity with a creamy layer on top). Both were served with their own tarot cards and at this point I was thinking about trying to collect them all.

When it was time for the entrees, we ordered the steak tartar, steak and kettle chips, Salam sliders, and added the Lunar Citrus Prawns. (Keep in mind 3 of us wanted to share everything to have a taste of everything)

Salam Sliders: served hot and tasty on their own. Perfect if you pair them with an appetizer in my opinion.

Steak and Kettle chips: orders medium rare and cooked to perfection. Served in a bowl with what they call witches butter. The butter melts over it and stays in the bowl so every bite has flavour. I had to fight my sister to get any of the kettle chips. Those were here favourite.

Lunar Citrus Prawns: Fresh and zesty. You could really taste the quality of the dish. I was expecting to get 4-5 prawns but I think I counted somewhere around 8. They were beautifully plated and if you like cilantro, this is the dish for you. I love cilantro and you could really taste it bringing all the flavours together.

Ritual steak tartare: Yep, this was my highlight. Beautifully plated and served with a quail egg, chimichurri on the side, as well as crostinis. This dish is a statement of the reason I will be back the next time I come to Vancouver! If you like rare meats, please do yourself a favour and try this because the only thing you will regret is that you couldn’t help but eat it so fast.

After we finished our entrees, we ordered all three desserts including their cheesecake, lava cake (which gets served by lighting something on fire!) and the Black Forest cake. The Black Forest cake was my favourite but all three would be a great way to end a meal.

While we were finishing our visit, I ordered one final drink and it was my favourite of the night. The star. This drink, no word of a lie, tastes like tiger tiger ice cream. It’s smooth and creamy even with the amount of alcohol in it. A very well crafted cocktail.

Their drinks are very booze forward, and for the amount of alcohol in them, added with the flare they provide, are a decent price.

Jade was our server and they are lucky to have her. We were very well looked after and she only added to the night.

All in all, we had a fantastic time and I will 100% be back. I have not stopped thinking about that steak tartare for the...

To start with the pros: ✨The food and drinks were really good! 10/10, definitely reccomend the bison salem sliders. ✨You need to try out the wheel of fortune for a drink! It was probably the best one someone at our table got and I feel it lets the bar tenders have fun too. ✨Of course the decor is fun and the music playing was a good selection.

Now for the cons: 🌙Feels like the staff has to read from a script unfortunately. The amount of times we were either told or I overheard lines like "we think it's important to have good food along with good drinks" or "It's nice to have a job I don't want to immediately leave once my shift is over". Honey... Blink twice if you need help. Just makes it feel impersonal. 🌙If you liked and miss the cozy vibes of Stormcrow, this won't fill that void. It's more of a dress up and have an actual event to celebrate of some sort, not a warm and nerdy chill spot for you and friends. So sadly Vancouver is still in need of that with Stormcrow gone. 🌙Just the nature of being downtown, it is more expensive, hence it more of a once in a blue moon/actual event to celebrate kind of a place to go. 🌙Honestly, pretty loud. Although I like the music choice, the volume of it was loud, making people talk loud at their tables. I found it really hard to hear our server at times so anyone with sensory issues will not do well. 🌙There is a time limit at your table, understandable, but a bit sad when we felt like there were longer periods of time where we weren't checked on. I do understand they are pretty busy though. 🌙Limited hours, there's not really a time you can go when there'd be less of a crowd/noise. I do honestly wish they'd open more at 2 or 3 with softer music for a bit just for those who want to avoid the noise.

Over all, it's worth a check out at least. I think it's a good place to go celebrate birthdays or milestones with friends. My one friend thought it'd be a good spot for a first date, but I don't think so, lol. It's best to know your date enough to know if they'd like it cause I'd find conversation way too hard to have, but my friend found no issues talking. So if you want to take a date here, find out if they have noise...

The drinks and decoration are really good. However, the service was quite disappointing. I was really excited to go there with my husband last night, but we were very disappointed with the service.

We requested a table for 2, and staff told us it would take 45 min to an hour. We left my name and phone number, but we waited for over an hour and they didn’t call. We went back to ask how much longer it would take, only for the hostess to tell us that the best she could do on Friday night were 2 bar seats by the bathroom (which smelled really bad), and that we had to leave the seats in 50 minutes.

I understand if you’re busy, but it would have been easier to say “sorry we don’t have tables available tonight without a reservation” instead of making us wait for over an hour only to be at the table for 50 minutes and saying “that’s the best I can do without a reservation”. I think the best would’ve been to be transparent since the beginning, we would have gone somewhere else instead.

Luckily the bartenders got us a few more minutes at the table to get snacks, which was great - we were very happy with the bartenders serving us.

The lack of vegan options was also upsetting. We asked if it was possible to get the charcuterie board without the meat and cheese, just with more bread and the rest of the items that already come with the board. They told us it wouldn’t be “worth it” for us or for the kitchen to prepare this.

We ended up getting the olives and chips, which were not worth it- we would’ve preferred having the charcuterie board as requested.

It doesn’t make sense to me how someone can tell us it’s not worth it, when we are keen to pay the full price for this, and I’m sure it would have been cheaper for them to prepare this option instead of the full board.

Anyways, giving it 2 stars because we enjoyed the drinks and atmosphere, but the service was quite...