Review: Don’t take Vancouver’s new Cuban-inspired bar Tocador too seriously

Name: Tocador

Location: 2610 Main St., Vancouver

Phone: 604-620-2433

Cuisine: Cuban bar snacks

Additional information: Open daily, 4 p.m. to 2 a.m.; no reservations

Rating: Cheap Eats

Guy Stowell makes smoke infused cocktails at Tocador in Vancouver, on Oct. 3, 2018.BEN NELMS/The Globe and Mail

At Main Street’s Tocador, a Cuban-inspired bar and restaurant awash in tropical greenery and pulsing with the vibrant tempo of Latin accordions, a burly hipster with a scruffy beard sidles up beside us at the pink-tiled bar and orders a Tocororo.

“I’ve heard so much about it,” he says of the ginger-beer cocktail mixed with paprika-infused tequila.

He’s not the only one. After taking fifth place in enRoute Magazine’s inaugural list published last month of Canada’s best new bars, hundreds of thousands of Air Canada customers have now potentially heard or read about this small, eclectic neighbourhood hangout spot that has been quietly frothing under the radar.

Owners Dale Styner and Guy Stowell were obviously caught by surprise. When I visited a few days after the awards were announced, they had just released a new list of cocktails. The early evening bartender was unfamiliar with several. He couldn’t even tell us what was featured in Tres Elementos, a signature tasting flight of three feature cocktails.

Best new bar in Canada? Hmm, seems kind of shaky – depending, that is, on the criteria for judging.

There are an awful lot of bar awards being handed out these days. It seems almost counterintuitive, but is perhaps strategic, given that legalized marijuana is expected to take a big bite out of booze sales.

Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants recently released its first guide to Canada’s 50 Best Bars (Vancouver’s Keefer Bar placed second). Last spring, the Vancouver Magazine Restaurant Awards resurrected its own best-bar category (The Keefer Bar didn’t so much as warrant an honourable mention).

Restaurant rankings are arbitrary at the best of times. Bars are even less clearly defined. How does a dingy speakeasy that specializes in pre-prohibition classic cocktails compare to a polished hotel bar that infuses seaweed into top-shelf gin by centrifuge? Do natural-wine bars, distillery bars and craft-brewery bars count? Do cover charges and loud music disqualify a bar by transforming it into a nightclub? Can a bar be contained within a restaurant or does it need to be a standalone watering hole?

I’ve been privy to some of these criteria-setting discussions. There is rarely a consensus, even among the judges who are voting.

The enRoute best new bar list was decided by New York-based journalist Kaitlin Fontana, based on tips from a cross-country panel of bartenders, journalists, chefs and sommeliers. Her tastes skew toward quirky, atmospheric, hidden gems: a Southeast Asian basement bar lit by paper lanterns (Nhậu Bar in Montreal); a jazzy, Victorian-era cubbyhole tucked behind an antique cabinet (Edmonton’s Little Hong Kong); a back-alley watering hole with space for nine people and only four drinks in rotation (El Pequeño Bar in Old Montreal).

In comparison, Tocador appears almost palatial with its deeply rounded chocolate-vinyl booths and 20-foot-long bar fitted with 15-odd stools. The room is bursting with colour and character. A turquoise winged bird-of-paradise soars against a yellow, palm-fringed sky in the entrance way mural. The back bar is lined with antique vanities (tocador is Spanish for dressing table) – an arresting, although not very ergonomic, display for jewel-hued glassware and bottles, including 30 types of rum. Rhythmic Afro-Cuban jazz sways at a comfortable volume in the background.

Ms. Fontana didn’t pay too much heed to the craft of making cocktails. Her impressions, always difficult to condense into small blurbs, are more sensory and primal, with an emphasis on ambiance and hospitality. It’s a refreshing approach, even my serious cocktailian companion will reluctantly concede, as she goes on to dissect Tocador’s ice program and flawed directional freezing, noting the king cubes are not crystal clear.

A Guava Spritz, a double rum punch and a Mojito at Tocador on Oct. 3, 2018.BEN NELMS/The Globe and Mail

If we were to get really nerdy and technical, there are some weaknesses with the drinks. The coconut-washed gin in the lavender-syrup-sweetened Bird Conspiracy is waxy with particulates, but the drink does have a bright lemon finish and spicy aftertaste from house-made cardamom bitters.

The nettle-infused bourbon-based Cigar Festival arrives with a bracing mist of Ardbeg smoke that cuts through the sweetness of aged port and maple syrup, but lacks a citrus element to hold it all up tight after the spritz dissipates and the ice dilutes.

Ah, but then we are served a bone-dry Hemingway Daiquiri that makes the mouth water. And a beautifully delicate guava-infused Aperol spritz topped with sparkling rose. Misted with geranium perfume, the latter makes my palate feel like it’s romping through a field of purple violets – in a good way.

I’m enjoying this sensual celebration of bar culture. So I’m not going to dwell on the greasy, dull-tasting rice and beans (although the sofrito was impressively diced into fine cubes). Or the Cubano sandwich that was all meat and no tang (the house-made bread had a nice, soft chew).

Let’s not talk about the flabby chorizo sausage in its soft, saggy sock casing that started oozing unctuous fat as soon as the meat lost heat. And I shouldn’t even tell you about the raisin rum carrot cake with its horribly sweet florets of supermarket-style frosting. Who goes to a bar to eat carrot cake?

Eat the croquettes: they’re golden-fried with a wonderful creamy meat centre, served over an earthy-spicy-tangy crema.

Drink with abandon and an open mind. If you ask nicely, the bartender might give you a taste of real Demerara rum from Guyana. The 15-year-old Eldorado blends so smoothly with Antica Formula (the vanilla-laced king of vermouth) and cold-brew coffee in the cherry-wood-smoked Cuban Genie.

Relax into the music. Soak up the tropical splendor. This is a bar appreciation, not a restaurant review. There are no rules or codified star ratings – at least not yet.