Anju

Calgary has a “Downtown West End,” just like Vancouver or, you know, London, but despite its comprising thousands of new and newish residents in massive, expensive condo towers, the area really lacks vibrancy. OUR West End was built up in the years somewhat pre-boom, with the first of these projects, a po-mo condo called “Axxis,” just finishing construction as Brian and I arrived in Calgary in 2000. It was followed by other similarly giant projects including The Marquis, the twin towers of Riverwest and Discovery, West Pointe, and Tarjan Pointe. So they brought the density, and one would expect that they’d bring the street life too. Problem was that too many of these developments offered zero retail space (the Bosa developments–Axxis, Riverwest, and Marquis–are the worst offenders in this regard; the Pointe of View ones, despite being esthetic nightmares, all have some podium retail) and even “tower in the park” suburban setbacks in some cases. All of this makes for a fragmented and unwelcoming pedestrian landscape, and I’m sure that when the residents of these towers want to go for an “urban” stroll they skip past their own community and cross the river into Kensington or head south past the tracks to 17th Avenue. This is unfortunate, because this captive audience of resident urbanites should make this neighbourhood one of the most interesting in town, like what they’ve accomplished in Yaletown in Vancouver, but it feels mostly empty and sad.

Set among these condo towers is a house at 507 10 St SW. One block north of Tarjan Pointe, and easy to miss, this building has housed a number of now-dead eateries. One was a coffeehouse called Thistles, which was notable for having a martini bar upstairs that was nonsmoking years before smoking bylaws would have forced it to be, and it SHOULD have been a success but wasn’t. Most recently it was called something like 507 Wine Bar and got good reviews, but was boarded up in what seemed like the blink of an eye.

A walk around this area back in, oh, September, revealed to me a new attempt at resuscitating this charming old house, something to be called “Anju,” a term that refers to Korean side dishes served with booze– in other words, Korean tapas, so a place called “Anju” just might be (I thought to myself), at long last, something like the Korean takes on izakaya that dot Vancouver. And I was right!

Anju has been getting rave reviews on chowhound and elsewhere, and I made my first visit today, for lunch, and am so glad I finally tried it! I arrived at around 11:30 and the very nice, gracious owner (her name is Anh) told me that the chef would be coming in around 15 minutes- same thing as happened on my first attempt for an early lunch, but this time I said, “well, let’s chat!” and we did- she told me that she and her husband (Roy) are the owners, that business has been good, and we got to talk a bit about the menu… Roy showed up a few minutes later and I ordered one of the “anju” (there are several different plates; “An Ju” would be like tapas or appies; there are “sides” for a buck or two incl things like extra rice and kimchi; there are noodle bowls, there are stone bowls, there are “mains,” there are deserts and there is a superb and interesting drinks menu too though I only had the delicious house-made, lightly sweet iced tea) and a bowl of ramen. Now the an ju I ordered was the “file fish” which was a sort of fish jerky in a little bowl, and a ramekin of Korean pepper paste to dip it into- this was a revelation, with the sweet-savory taste of a good jerky with a side of pleasant (really) fishiness, the pieces are thin and translucent too, and the whole experience of eating this little pile of morsels was completely bizarre and foreign to me but interesting and delicious. $5.

My ramen had interesting and tasty spins too. The ramen noodles, I must first note, were delicious, nice texture. These were in a kimchi-accented broth (and their kimchi is house-made and LOVELY) with plentiful slices of pork belly and the whole thing was topped with a dollop of creme fraiche. Amazing- my only complaint was that I’d have liked more kimchi, more bit to counter how very smoothed-out the creme made the bowl, but that’s a minor quibble and I loved this item. At dinner this would have come with kimchi on the side anyway so my complaint is minor. $13.

Lunch was $20 with the iced tea ($2 and bottomless!) and it was a treat to have the place to myself (one reason why I always dine early or late, for lunch at least) and to be able to chat with owners who are doing such a briliant job in uncharted waters bringing something truly new to this city. Let’s hope it continues to pay off!

Anju is at 507 10 St SW. WEBSITE