Meld Ceilidh Sutherland and Dan Vorstermans’ entrepreneurial spirit, food and drink chops and love for nature and you’ll get Field Guide Restaurant and Bar, their casual restaurant with quality food, opening this fall at 2082 Gottingen Street. Like the field guides to birds and flowers, this one will be a “guide to everything edible in Nova Scotia” with a ever-changing menu of seasonally-inspired dishes intended for sharing. And good drinks, too. The pair are working with bartender extraordinaire Jeff Van Horne to design the bar and cocktail list.
“Field Guide is a small restaurant dedicated to bridging the gap between diners and their food—where it comes from, who grew it, why it tastes the way it does—through passionate service, an open concept kitchen and a chalk board menu,” says Sutherland, who’s currently a manager at Just Us!. She’ll run the front of house while Vorstermans, a sous chef at Morris East, takes the helm in the kitchen. “We both feel that eating locally-produced, high quality food makes sense so you can expect the menu to be a constant reflection of what is being grown and produced in Nova Scotia.”
Adding to the growing north end dining scene, Field Guide will boast 35 seats—12 of which will be at the bar. “We want to encourage people to eat at the bar; to watch and talk to the bartender and cooks,” says Vorstermans. “It's about breaking down that barrier between front and back of house; and between guest and employee.”
Study the Field Guide for updates and sneak peeks on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook at fieldguidehfx.
