Canucks Bar & Grill French Dip Review at the Vancouver YVR Airport

So I'm on my way from Vancouver to Bentonville, AR on business.  I was ending a little vacation and going back to work.  Walmart was one of my clients at the time and I was visiting for our Quarterly Business Review with them.

I enjoyed a Stella or two as a waited for my flight.  I sat by a couple of characters.  The guys were both roughly my age.  One was a pilot who had a lot of critical things to say about flying and his career; somehow he'd gotten in trouble or accused of bad behavior.  The other guy was on his way to his brother's bachelor's party in Vegas and Coachella and he was planning to have a very good time.  I hope he came home alive!

I had to get it.

Here it is, with tomato soup.  Two wooding toothpicks.

Doesn't look great, kind of messy and cheesy and had the mayo on it (I had forgotten.  Sad!)

Lots of beef.

A tiny little thing of jus.  WTH.

Toasted.

Maybe it doesn't have much beef.

Jus not overly dark when dipped. :(

Tasting Notes

This thing gets a 2 overall
Good size, though
Tiny jus
Forgot to ask for Mayo separate.  :(  Sad!
Flavor alone 2.  Not great at all.
Sloppy and wet.  Sad!
Jus had 3 in flavor and wasn't gravy-like as I'd experienced at GLC in Whistler
Meat fell out.  Sloppy / messy!
Unnecessarily Sloppy and untidy sandwich.  Too much lube!
Bread was a 3
Meat was bad: 1 dry, overcooked roast beef
Not hot.  Sad!
Tomato soup 3

Avoid this French dip at the airport.  Not good.

2 of 5 DeliciScore™ (Not Quite There) Awarded to McMenamins Anderson School for their Prime Rib Dip Sandwich in Bothell, WA on this 1st day of November, 2015 - Give me a break, people.

Jessica and I went out and had a great time for Halloween and I was in need of a French dip on the way home.  We agreed it would be fun to go check out the new McMenamins establishment in Bothell, near where we live.  I was super excited to go there and was very pleased when I saw they had a French dip on their menu.

This is how it read:  Boilermaker Dip: shaved prime rib, Gruyere, peppered Hogshead onions & stout-onion jus $17

So I was pumped.  It looked like they'd put some effort into this thing and it was unique.  So we ordered a red beer (Coors Light and tomato juice which can be so good, by the way) and waited and waited for our French dip to come out.  Well, it did eventually arrive and I wish it never had.  It ruined my day and made me angry for the rest of it.  Sorry, McMenamins for this scathing review but I absolutely hate your French dip and really think you need to resolve that issue.  It should be an anchor and it should be delicious.  Take a look around this blog for ideas of things you could do right.  This isn't right.

This is and was a terrible French dip.  Do not get it.  Take my word for it.  I hated it with a passion and am still angry thinking about it.  It was $17 and absolute garbage.  Yeah, they tried to make it fancy with their fancy cheese and onions and beer in the jus but it's garbage.  And it was small and it tasted bad and took them a very long time to deliver and it was expensive!

Watch all the photos as a video slideshow.

Really cool new place in Bothell that I am super excited about.

One of their three super cool restaurants on site.  They also have a swimming pool, movie theater and hotel.  I really like McMenamins.

The menu showing the Boilermaker Dip: shaved prime rib, Gruyere, peppered Hogshead onions & stout-onion jus $17

It took way too long for us to get served.  I was not offered an alternative to fries, either.  First impressions were disappointment.  Small sandwich.  No real girth to this thing at all.  Sad.

More terrible evidence.

The jus had the 'floating fat' that I actually like and seek in a good jus but I would later come to find that I didn't really like this jus at all.

There's the sandwich, I wasn't impressed.  Gruyere was too bitter and the onions too sweet, coupled with the sweet jus.  And what are Hogshead onions anyhow?!

There's the sandwich.  It was no good.

Dunked.

Little bits of floating onion in this too sweet jus.

This was an incredibly disappointing sandwich for the price.  It was just no good.  Made me sad.

Bread 3 of 5  Whatever
Meat 1 of 5  Couldn't even taste the meat
Non-Meat Toppings 0 of 5  Waste of time with the Gruyere and onions
Jus 3 of 5  Too sweet.  Gimicky
Sandwich 1 of 5  Hated it
Overall 2 of 5  Hated it

Download the audio review