E big room, small menu, fun drinks and continually inventive plates make Blue Water Cafe a culinary playground. The appealing all-things-to-all-people vibe is just as it should be. Blue Water is housed in a 100-year-old brick and beam heritage warehouse conversion (don't touch anything), featuring exposed timbers, beams, and brick. The dining room offers direct views of the open kitchen and raw bar headed by Yoshihiro Tabo.

The space caters well to the happy-hour crowd. Further back in the surprisingly large space are two linen-swathed dining rooms, one rather grand and one rather petite. The crowd varies accordingly; expect a mix of young record-label up-and-comers from the Yaletown area.

Blue Water Cafe has been mobbed by casually hip diners since it opened, and for good reason: Both Chef Frank Pabst’s menu and service are excellent. The reasonably authentic menu items sampled (the best wild seafood) were pleasing, with the exception of the oddly dry Arctic Char, but the crowning achievement was the huge plate of Kobe Beef Short Ribs, with kumquats, and reduced braising juices with sherry. Blue water: so much better than brown water. - R.L.