Put Banff on Your Year-Round Travel List as a Gourmet Getaway

The Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise is cozied up alongside the impossible, blue glacial waters of the lake whose name it bears. It’s a majestic setting, and during the long winter, those pristine waters freeze solid into an ice sheet you can walk over. The Canadian Rockies can be frigid at such times, but the resort knows how to fix you up within its old-school, wood-paneled Walliser Stube restaurant. The answer, of course, is a bubbling bowl of molten cheese.

Walliser Stube is renowned for its fondue, and lucky diners may be able to score a recipe to make it at home. Its signature three-cheese rendition, flavored with garlic, kirsch, white wine and nutmeg, comes with an array of dippers in the form of bread, baby potatoes, pickles and vegetables, and is best paired with a crisp, dry glass of Riesling. But the fairy tale setting is what turns a wonderful, warming meal into an iconic and unforgettable one.

Yes, Banff has long been known for its stunning, pristine environs. Located about 90 minutes west of Calgary, it’s one of the world’s most sought-after hiking locales in the summer, and a bustling skiing hub during the winter. The town itself has some 8,000 residents yet Banff National Park — incorporating the town, the surrounding mountains and valleys, and areas such as Lake Louise — pulls in about four million annual visitors. It’s a staggering ratio. But now, Banff boasts a vibrant dining and drinking scene to match its epic setting, and whether that fondue is your grand finale or serves as the appetizer to a weekend of feasting, you’ll be in good hands as you hop between its standout bars and restaurants.

“Banff’s culinary scene has evolved immensely over the past five to 10 years and restaurateurs are really raising the bar,” says Jessica Pacheco. As the head of sales and marketing for Banff Hospitality Collective, she would know. The group operates a staggering 16 restaurants and bars within a five-minute walk within Banff’s tiny, charming downtown, and has been at the forefront of its culinary reinvention.

BHC’s cuisines and concepts vary, but the common threads are laid back, welcoming atmospheres and a local-first ethos. “We design experiential restaurants that blend unique concepts with a deeply rooted sense of place,” Pacheco says. “Banff inspires everything we do.”

The town, and region, came out swinging after Canada’s stringent COVID-era restrictions were removed, adding to the allure of what was already a jaw-dropping outdoor destination. Plan a trip at any time of the year, skipping the summer frenzy or the winter chill, and make the most out of your visit one bite, or sip, at a time. “A huge evolution has taken place since the pandemic,” Pacheco says. “It was like the great reset — after years of restrictions people were ready to go out and were looking for places to socialize and really connect with one another.”

6 More Ways to Eat & Drink Your Way Across Banff

I couldn’t possibly blame you if you did nothing but order that fondue time and time again. It’s a sound strategy. But here’s how to build out a complete and dynamic dining and drinking itinerary across Banff with a series of must-try experiences.

Blend Your Own Gin at Park Distillery: Park Distillery produces a lineup of gin and vodka, in addition to bottled cocktails, and is aging its own whiskey as well. Its mineral-rich, fresh water supply is a key attribute of its spirits, along with the spruce tips it forages for in the national park to use in its Alpine Gin. Its products are widely found across Banff’s bar scene, a smart strategy, especially considering that due to tariffs and tumultuous international relations, local liquor stores were seen only selling American-made spirits until their existing stock ran out on a visit earlier this year.

While tours and tastings are available, and the distillery has an on-site bar and restaurant, the most hands-on way to get involved is with a DIY blend your own gin workshop. Guests are given a choice of 12 botanicals they can select and stuff into a tea sachet to infuse a bottle of take-home spirit, along with a recommended set of three bases to help get started, including forest, floral and citrus flavors.

Visit Japan via Shoku Izakaya: A meal at Shoku Izakaya is a capable stand-in for Japanese food lovers who are otherwise killing time between trips to Tokyo. Japanese pub fare ranges from karaage chicken, gyoza and yakitori, to specialties such as nori-dusted Tokyo fries, bao buns and a full menu of sushi. Cocktails are worthy of your attention as well, such as the bright pink Majin Buu Sour made with tequila, umeshu and dragon fruit or a Wild Rhubarb Negroni. Other creative experiments on a recent visit included a duck fat-washed sour.

Sample Through the Banff Cocktail Trail: Banff is known for its trails, but this is the type of trail I’m ready to hike across. No hiking boots necessary, but your drinking hat is. A number of bars have joined forces to launch the Banff Cocktail Trail, and in conjunction with local purveyor Jolene’s Tea House, serve tea-infused or -based specialty drinks. There are about half a dozen current participants you can knock out during your stay, with Hello Sunshine and Lupo among the recommended stops.

Eat These Proudly Local Ingredients: The province of Alberta has created a list of seven local foods that it produces. The list includes beef, bison, canola, honey, red fife wheat, root vegetables,and Saskatoon berries, and it’s easy to find them all during the course of a single trip to Banff.

Here’s a few helpful pointers. For bison, look no further than The Bison, of course. It’s on the menu in at least four ways, including in a bison tartare, a two-person tomahawk steak and as the base of a Bolognese. The restaurant has a map of dozens of producers and purveyors that it sources its ingredients from across Alberta and British Columbia, and sources most of its wines from Canada as well.

For beef, head to 1888 Chop House, housed within the immaculate Fairmont Banff Springs, a hotel known as The Castle In The Rockies. The restaurant showcases several premium Alberta beef cuts amid its steak offerings. Don’t skip the house milk bread rolls, served in a cast iron pan and dusted with everything seasoning, and an amuse of grownup poutine in the form of a crunchy fried potato square topped with gruyere, bordelaise sauce and roe. Keep your eyes open for the roving Champagne cart, while you’re at it.

Enroll in a Cocktail Class at the Rundle Bar: Head to the impressive Rundle Bar, also at the Fairmont Banff Springs, a cavernous two-story space that received a face lift several years ago and harkens back to the property’s original heyday in the 1920s with leather lounge seating, ornate chandeliers and extra tall back bar displays. A daily cocktail class is offered at the upper-level bar, and you’ll be able to mix up and sample three of their offerings, with recipe cards of each and a bottled cocktail provided as souvenirs. If you’d prefer to have the bar team do the work for you, well, there’s a deep whiskey list to choose from, a house-exclusive gin and ample seating that serves looks of the picture-perfect Banff scenery to match.

Indulge in Afternoon Tea: Are your pants stretchy enough to boldly forge ahead, when others would have long since given up all hope and surrendered? Then make afternoon tea at the Chateau Lake Louise your final call. Set within an elegant dining room with enormous windows looking out at the lake, the hotel’s afternoon tea is foreboding in its indulgence.

Enjoy a glass of bubbles or three and choose from a dozen prestige teas as you nosh on loaded towers of sandwiches, scones — incorporating Saskatoon berries among the accompaniments, no less — and desserts. Still standing? Go ahead, add on the seafood tower stacked with lobster and caviar while you’re at it. For your sake, I hope that you’ve been earning all of this out on the mountains. Go ahead and stretch your legs, get some fresh air. I’ve heard Banff is kind of known for it.