Visit our Instagram page
The last person who expected Kovic Prévost to open a restaurant — least of all in Vancouver — was Kovic Prévost. A nomadic cook since his teenage years in his native Montreal, a combination of restlessness and unpredictable life circumstances brought him to Vancouver, home to Montreal, Vancouver again, Japan, the French alps, and Vancouver a third time (and possibly several other destinations he neglected to mention).
In Summer 2022, he opened @isthatfrench, a cheekily-named wine bar and small-plates eatery in the long-dormant space in Gastown’s Blood Alley that had previously housed the trailblazing Salt Tasting Room. Within weeks, it was attracting full houses — and it (very deservedly) still is. But had it not been for the persuasion of the building’s owner and various people in Prévost’s social circle, it never would have happened.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
What’s your earliest memory of being taken to a restaurant?
That’s a good question. It all leads back to family holidays. We used to go every year — or every couple of years, maybe — to the East Coast: Virginia Beach, Cape Cod, Provincetown. And then I grew up on seafood. My happiest memories are when the family would drive down to the East Coast. I was raised by parents that were, like, the kids’ menu was not an option. It was like, “You want to eat? You eat with us.” And so I grew up eating mussels, lobster, clam chowder. I’m very grateful, because they exposed me to a lot of amazing food. My friends were eating pizza pockets. Even though my parents weren’t great cooks, they really enjoyed eating. We didn’t have much money, but food was always important.
This leads to the inevitable but very unoriginal question: What made you want to be a cook?
I just liked it. I came [to Vancouver] when I was 17 or 18, to learn English, and I stayed here for almost a year. And I helped out with a catering company in the Okanagan Valley: peeling potatoes, asparagus… They only bought food from the Okanagan, and they had their own pigs and made their own charcuterie, and grew their own vegetables. And one day, at the end of the summer, they were like, “Thank you so much for your work. We have an empty spot at one of the dinners. Do you want to come and eat?” And I did, and it was delicious. But even more than that, it was, “These guys are amazing at what they do.”
So, I went back to Montreal and I knew I wanted to become a cook. I started as a dishwasher in a restaurant. I enjoyed the fast pace. It was a very busy French restaurant, and the dish pit was full, and people were yelling, and the servers were running around, and I fell in love with it. I have ADHD, and this fed my brain. I would crush my work in the dish pit and then go to the chef and be like, “What are you doing now? Can I help?”
Did you go to culinary school?
No. I just worked in restaurants. I learned under two chefs in that French restaurant for four years. It was there for a long time — almost 30 years. It was tartar, duck-leg confit, pasta. I learned the basics: how to cure your duck, how to chop your tartar, trim your meat. But then I burned out — four years of a real grind. So, I left and came back to Vancouver. I needed to do something different.
What brought you back here the second time?
I didn’t really want to come back to Canada. (laughs) I was married to an Australian, and then we were stuck in Europe during the pandemic. I was a private chef, so in the winter we were working in France, in the Alps, taking care of a luxury chalet where she would manage and I would cook. And then the pandemic happened that winter, in March. We were so secluded in the Alps, and then, all of a sudden, everything shut down. We tried to go back to Australia, but we couldn’t, so we decided to try Canada. And then my wife managed to get a tourist visa, which was at least a guarantee of entry. I thought, should we go back to Quebec? But my wife said, “I cannot do those winters.” It would be minus 40C and she wouldn’t wear gloves. She came back and her hands were purple.
But I’d lived in Vancouver before, so I reached out to some friends, and they said it was a bit smoother here. Some patios were still open. I got to work straight away.
When you first arrived back, where were you working?
I worked for Meet. I’d opened the first location, on Main Street, before I left Vancouver over 10 years ago. I was their first head chef. It was a fun experience, but I was young — like, in my early 20s. I didn’t really know what I was doing, then I burned myself out working too much. That’s when I booked a one-way ticket to Japan and left. So, when I came back to Vancouver, I got a job with Meet before even landing. I wanted something safe, and they were doing a lot of takeout back then. I worked there for over a year.
And then I met Scott [Hawthorn], and he said, “Do you want to open a restaurant?” And I was, like, “What?” (laughs)
It was, of all people, your landlord — the owner of the former Salt Tasting Room space in Gastown — who persuaded you to open your own restaurant. How did that happen?
Do you know who Janaki Larsen is?
I don’t.
Janaki is quite a famous ceramist in Vancouver. I worked for her years ago, and we became good friends and we kept in touch. One day I went to her studio to say hi. And then I left, and then she texted me a few minutes later, saying, “By the way, I just moved into a new studio and I want to do an opening party. Do you want to do the food for it?” And obviously I said, “I’d love to do that for you.” So, I came and cooked, and Scott is Janaki’s landlord and also a good friend. He came to the event and we started chatting, and he tried my food. The Salt Tasting Room space had been empty for, like, a year and a half, and he’d had a hard time finding someone for the space. Salt had been there for, what, 16 or 17 years? When it closed, Scott was looking to put something meaningful in the space, but he had a hard time finding a tenant that fit with his vision.
Scott called me the day after Janaki’s party and he said, “She gave me your number. I really enjoyed your food and chatting with you. I’ve got this space for a restaurant. Are you interested in opening one?” But I was like, “Not really.” (laughs) My life was chaotic: I was going through a separation, working a lot at Meet and trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. I was like, “Do I want to stay in Vancouver?”
I asked, “Where’s the space?” He said Blood Alley. And I’m like, “The Salt Tasting Room space?” I used to go there all the time when I first lived in Vancouver. I didn’t know it was for rent.
I’ve never heard a story before about how a landlord was the primary catalyst to convince someone to open a restaurant.
When people ask me, “How did you end up opening a restaurant?”, I say, “It kind of came to me.” Scott and I met that same afternoon and talked for hours and hours. He asked me, “Pretend you could open a restaurant. What’s your vision?” And I was talking a lot about growing up in Montreal and missing the community, building community, doing something meaningful. And I also complained about the restaurant industry in Vancouver — the cost and everything. He said, “We’ve got the same vision. Go home and think about it. Build a business plan.”
Once you knew the Salt space was available to you, did you know immediately what you wanted to do with it in terms of the food you were going to serve?
Not really. I knew I was limited. I couldn’t burn anything. [The de facto kitchen, located behind the bar, is small, and isn’t designed for hood vents, which rules out stovetops and grills.] I love seafood, so I wanted oysters and wine. The goal was to open an oyster bar, because oysters are raw and you don’t need much space. And then I thought, “Let’s do small plates to start.” I didn’t have a lot of money to open, so equipment was very scarce. I put all my savings into it.
And then we opened and we slowly built on that. It was a small wine list, a small food menu — things that are safe. It wasn’t going to blow anyone’s mind, but we could do it. And then I started exploring: Where can I push this? I got an induction oven, a blowtorch; I began curing, fermenting, pickling. And I realized, “Oh, you can actually do a lot without a full oven!” There was a lot of passion, a lot of love, and a lot of hours of work. I think my focus, when we first opened, was just the vibe and the service. I wanted to connect with people, for the service to be a warm. You know: “Welcome to our place!”
It’s funny: The person who was least enthusiastic about the idea of you opening a restaurant was you. It was the people around you who wanted you to do it.
It was because of community. I’d left for almost a decade and then came back, and then, not long after, there was a community telling me, “We want you to open a restaurant.” I don’t think I would have done it without that. Everything grows better with community, with the support of your friends.
(Photo: Max Chesnut)
Jewkarta 