Nomo Nomo Japanese Snack Bar Opens Tomorrow

Anyone can tell you that travel to Japan is so hot right now—so much so that after a record year of “overtourism” in 2024, the cities of Kyoto and Hokkaido have implemented a daily tourist levy.

The ideal alternative, starting September 17, is a visit to the Vancouver’s newest Japanese dining bar, Nomo Nomo.

Set on Commercial Drive—somewhere between Havana and Merci Beaucoup Cafe, if you need a landmark—a sleek, dark walnut bar lined with premium spirits (including five different sakes) opens to a narrow room where a smattering of framed Japanese pop culture posters and neon signs line the walls under dimmed lights. On the airwaves, songs from “Cowboy Bebop” flood the room. It’s fair to say that, on first experience, Nomo Nomo is heavy on ambiance.

The 26-seat Japanese dining bar is a new concept for Vancouver, but Nomo Nomo is inspired by Tokyo’s long-held tradition of yoshoku (Western-influenced Japanese comfort food), and serves up fusion-y bites along with a stellar selection of sakes and creative cocktails.

The eatery is the brainchild of Vancouver restaurant vets Benedict Lim (The Lunch Lady), Wayne Chow, Heedong Choi, Lucas Szaraz, Michael Tran (also of The Lunch Lady) and Bernard Lim (Fat Rabbit).

“Nomo Nomo takes the izakaya spirit but bends it,” writes Benedict Lim in a release. “It’s intentionally Japanese-ish, global in its influence, and always a little playful. The goal is simple, food that feels familiar but also reminds you of another memory.”

The concept has been 20 years in the making, Lim and co. told a room full of people at a media preview, where samples of the upcoming menu made their first debut. 

First, a sipping glass of the Tanigawadake Junmai super dry sake opened up into our first three bites: the prawn toast, a play on Hong Kong prawn toast, “not popular in Vancouver,” says Lim, but made on a spongy Chinese donut that is lightly spicy, crispy and cloud-like; then, the tomago sando on a square of milk toast, topped with an egg salad with red crab and black truffle; and the croquette—our personal favourite of the trio of share plates—was a play on a western aburi nigiri, a Japanese potato croquette topped with a flame-torched and melt-in-your-mouth king salmon with big, salty ikura pearls. 

The bigeye tuna comes on a half-shell corn tortilla covered with juicy, tender pieces of Hamachi tuna on a guac-like avocado salsa. The giant crunch makes it hard to eat gracefully, so you’ll want to come with someone you’re comfortable eating around for this dish.

Next, the steak tartare came with medium-chopped wagyu beef, surrounded by parilla, endive and radicchio leaves and sheets of nori (so you could choose which to fill it with). Asian sensibilities made this dish deliciously distinct in texture and taste from its French origin. And, if you want to follow it up with even more meat, the juicy, tender Iberico Tomahawk (a nine-ounce bone-in chop with apples two ways: carmelized and kimchi) won’t disappoint.

Another stunner was the hen of the wood dish: an east-meets-west, Italian-meets-Asian plate of wild mushrooms with Thai basil in a creamy sauce. “This is one of those ugly delicious kind of dishes,” Lim told our table as he made his rounds across the narrow 26-seater eatery.

But that’s just the food—where the spot really shines is its cocktail program, led up by Chow and Szaraz, who have created a Japanese-inspired cocktail program that pairs the spot’s izakaya staples.

The Tonka cocktail, served with baguette ice in a fluted glass, is made with a vanilla rooibos Suntory Toki, tonka cordial and apricot syrup, reading like a boozy peach juice, while Kuri is a little more spirit forward, with St. Remy signature, tawny port, chestnut, lemon and pear with clarified Hokkaido milk, topped with a crisped apple slice.

From the eight signature drinks, two are modifiable to be zero-proof options: the Papurika (a spicy vodka-kombu drink topped with a charred pepper) and the Ume. The latter is a tart and citrusy drink, with a foamy egg white to top it off. 

Best of all, the cozy and well-kept bar, flooded with funky tunes, is exactly the kind of spot you could sit for a few hours with a friend under the warm neon lights, noshing your way through shared yoshoku bites and drinks, all while pretending you did get on that flight to Japan, after all. The thing is—you’re going to need a reservation to secure your seat.

1268 Commercial Drive
nomonomo.ca