CITRUS-SCENTED RAIN UNDER A SNOW MOON || BC-Grown Citrus Shapes a New Seasonal Menu in Vancouver
Winter in Vancouver rarely brings the scent of citrus. Yet inside Burdock & Co this season, the dining room fills with the bright perfume of bergamot, sudachi, and Palestinian lime.
The source is unexpected. Just across the Salish Sea on Salt Spring Island, a small regenerative farm is cultivating more than thirty varieties of citrus inside a 6,000-square-foot greenhouse. What once seemed improbable on the West Coast has quietly become a new ingredient story for the region.
Citrus-Scented Rain Under a Snow Moon showcases bergamot, sudachi, Palestinian lime and other rare fruit sourced from The Garden, Jane Squier’s regenerative farm.
Chef-proprietor Andrea Carlson has built her Michelin-starred restaurant on relationships with farmers, foragers, and ocean stewards. For her latest tasting menu, titled Citrus-Scented Rain Under a Snow Moon, fruit from Jane Squier’s farm, known as The Garden, provides a luminous thread running throughout the experience.
For Carlson, the discovery felt almost like a gift.
“As a chef working in a community that does not normally have access to local citrus, this is such a gift to discover and share.”
The Garden itself offers a compelling glimpse into what climate-resilient agriculture could look like on the West Coast. The greenhouse operates as a closed-loop system in which rainwater supplies irrigation, renewable heat is stored in thermal-mass pools, and organic waste is converted into fuel and fertilizer by an anaerobic digester. The entire operation runs with roughly the energy footprint of a single household, a quietly radical model for food production in a warming yet uncertain climate.
That philosophy naturally carries over to Carlson’s plates.
One of the opening dishes draws attention to another ecological challenge closer to the ocean floor. Local red sea urchin, a species whose population boom has devastated Pacific kelp forests, appears as a rich sauce beside sake-kasu braised burdock and a delicate custard made from burdock peel, brightened with Meyer lemon. Pickled baby bull kelp from Moon Bay Ocean Farm on the Sunshine Coast finishes the dish, linking the menu to emerging aquaculture efforts restoring coastal ecosystems.
Seasonality at Burdock & Co moves quickly. Carlson reshapes the tasting menu roughly every two months, a rhythm that keeps the kitchen in constant dialogue with the land and sea. The annual citrus edition has quietly become one of the restaurant’s most anticipated transitions, a signal that winter is loosening its grip.
Among the new highlights is charcoal-grilled squab glazed with Palestinian lime. The fruit appears three ways across the dish, lending floral acidity to the glaze, the honeyed jus, and a mousseline stuffing tucked beneath the bird. Rabbit dumplings in bergamot-scented broth offer another expression of the citrus harvest, available as an optional starter or bar snack.
Dessert brings the restaurant’s familiar landscape metaphor to the table. Candied white kombu, spruce-tip mousse, apple granita, and preserved quince form a layered composition that feels part forest, part shoreline, part orchard. A light foam made from Buddha’s hand citron finishes the dish with aromatic lift.
Some returning favourites also benefit from the new harvest. Carlson’s Bergamot Pommes Anna, a beloved staple, arrives topped with crème fraîche, chimichurri, and a delicate cream made from potato skins, its buttery layers perfumed by what the farm calls its best crop yet of the herbaceous Mediterranean orange.
Elsewhere on the menu, wild rosehips gathered in the Okanagan Valley are simmered into a clear consommé paired with yellowfin tuna and a sudachi-Calabrian chilli paste. Rosehips, left on the vine beneath winter snow, slowly ferment in nature, developing deep dried-fruit notes that echo the brightness of the citrus.
Carlson’s creativity also extends to plant-based interpretations of classic delicacies. Her version of ankimo, often called the foie gras of the sea, replaces monkfish liver with celeriac. Pan-seared and lacquered with a yuzu barbecue glaze, the round is served with a confit scallop and a tangy yuzu emulsion that balances richness with sharp citrus clarity.
Together, the dishes form a quiet meditation on resilience. Citrus grown in a northern greenhouse, kelp returning to the ocean floor, rosehips sweetened by snow. At Burdock & Co, these ingredients become something more than a seasonal menu. They hint at a future where thoughtful cultivation and careful cooking bring new brightness to the table.
The tasting menu Citrus-Scented Rain Under a Snow Moon runs at Burdock & Co in Vancouver through April 6, 2026.
Tasting menu: $175
Wine pairings: $90 and $135
Zero-proof pairing: $65
Reservations encouraged
Bar walk-ins welcome
VISIT
Burdock & Co
2702 Main St
Vancouver, BC V5T 3E8
604-879-0077
Photography by Hakan Burcuoglu
