Broth House
Broth House
A HIDDEN GEM ON GRANVILLE STREET
BY LAURA OAKLEY
PHOTOS MICHELLE DOUCETTE
Although sandwiched between two busy arteries—Barrington and Hollis Streets—most of Granville Street has never earned the same attention or foot traffic. It’s always had an underground feel. To visit Granville, you need a reason.
The most southern stretch of Granville Street and nearby areas, recently, have seen their fair share of redevelopment—another turn-off for the average pedestrian. But if you look closer, you will see businesses popping up on Halifax’s quieter “back” streets, after the chaos, in sleek new buildings that are slowly replacing old ones. Found in the rear of the newly redeveloped Green Lantern building, Broth House is one of these businesses, at 1588 Granville—an address rich with Halifax history.
The Green Lantern Building (officially named the Keith Building) is an iconic heritage building at 1585 Barrington Street, built in 1896. It is more commonly referred to as the Green Lantern Building because of the Green Lantern restaurant that operated on the ground floor from 1917 until the 1960s. After extensive damage in 2003 from Hurricane Juan, the building was useless for several years and nearly demolished. Halifax City Council approved its redevelopment plan (with much fanfare) in 2016, including nine residential stories and commercial storefronts to face Granville Street.
The Granville-facing part of the building has been home to a fascinating collection of businesses over the years, including Critic’s Choice Video Store, Cafe Mokka, and Tribeca nightclub. And now Broth House, in one of the shiny new commercial spaces. This humble noodle bar quietly serves up a pleasing collection of from-scratch noodle and rice dishes that most people have come to know and love—and others worth getting to know—giving us an excellent reason to visit.
Chef Chris Huang
“I wanted to cook for people the things I love,” says owner and chef Chris Huang. “[These dishes] tend to not all appear on the same menu in one restaurant.” The relatively small offering packs in Huang’s ideal comfort foods like tonkotsu ramen, Taiwanese beef and dandan noodles. You can also find appetizers like pork bao and pot stickers.
Inside, eight bright red high-top bar seats face an open kitchen, and just a handful of low tables fill the rest of the modest space along the windows looking out on Granville. Broth House also offers a customizable noodle bowl menu. Huang hoped to have this style of service catch on—where customers pencil in their choices of noodles, meat, spice level and other variables, hand it in at the cash and pay, then sit at the bar to receive their bowl of steaming noodles. Alas, the clientele has opted for the local standard of eat first, pay later. (Both service styles are available, but
I recommend sitting at the bar and watching Huang cook either way.)
Huang, alongside his wife Shuyi, opened Broth House on April 3rd, 2022. They moved to Halifax in 2015 for university after growing up together in Chengdu, a city in the Sichuan region of China. Huang had the idea for Broth House, but his background was in marketing and engineering. “I started looking for jobs in a professional kitchen,” says Huang. “I needed to get experience, I needed to know how a kitchen runs.” After a year of working in kitchens, Huang was ready to open his place—with some culinary help. Although now, Huang is pretty much flying solo.
Taiwanese Beef
“The best seller would be the Taiwanese beef,” says Huang. “We use the beef shank. When you cook it long enough it becomes very, very tender.” The bowl looks beautiful—a base of richly-coloured beef broth and hand-cut noodles topped generously with three pieces of braised beef shank, bok choy, scallions, cilantro, a soft-boiled soy egg cut in half, and pickled mustard leaves. The broth is full of deep umami flavours (thank you, fermented soybean paste), and the beef, as promised, is fall-apart tender. The bok choy is still slightly crispy, offering a balancing of textures, and the pickled mustard leaves give a slight acidity to cut through the robust, velvety beef broth. The noodles are excellent—custom-made for Huang by DH Noodle Shop in Fairview and delivered fresh each week.
I sample a couple of starters, too, including the pork bun—chashu (Japanese braised pork belly) and shredded lettuce in a sweet, white, sticky steam bun. It is spot-on and doesn’t disappoint. The pork pot stickers are also classic—juicy, savoury pork and Napa cabbage filling, tender dough, and chopped scallions. The fiery house-made chilli oil gets my attention on the first dip. “I use three different temperatures [to make] the chilli oil,” says Huang. "I use a high temperature for the spiciness and colour, and it brings out the fragrance from all of the chillies as well.” My advice is to start small and dip cautiously, as Sichuan pepper is involved.
Pot Stickers
Although Sichuan is famous for spicy food, Huang knows that not all diners in Halifax are up for heat. Only two of the eleven menu items have a chilli pepper icon, warning patrons of the impending fire. But, any dish at Broth House can be Sichuan-spicy if you ask.
Dandan is a famous Sichuan street food, a broth-free noodle dish usually made with ground pork. At Broth House, the dandan noodles meet spicy ground beef, the savoury-spicy sauce made from sesame, chilli oil and soy. It has some heat, but Huang treads lightly. At the end of the day, dandan is just a big bowl of noodle comfort—rich and savoury with a touch of fire, crisp scallions and bok choy, plus that perfect, soft egg yolk. Final verdict: Highly addictive. The pickled daikon is also worth mentioning; although it is an appetizer, it is the perfect palate cleanser for me. Thinly sliced sweet pickled daikon in nutty sesame oil makes for refreshing bites between noodle dishes.
Taiwanese Beef and Dan Dan Noodles
Right now, lunch is the busiest time for Huang, who has earned repeat business from people who work in the neighbourhood. The most expensive dish on the menu at Broth House is $15.99—so it’s no wonder that nearby lunch-goers have scoped out this noodle bar as a weekly go-to. The portions are impressive, and the food is filling and made with care.
“In the beginning, I was not as confident as I am now. Now I do everything by myself from Tuesday to Friday,” says Huang, including the front-of-house duties. On Friday and Saturday nights, Huang has a server come in to cover the front while he focuses only on cooking. Broth House is open from noon to 8 p.m. throughout the week, except for Friday, when they close at 9 p.m. On Saturday, they are open for dinner from 5 to 9 p.m. Sunday and Monday, they close.
Broth House is still very much hidden on its part of Granville Street but stands to earn a considerable following. Huang’s dedication to making his favourite dishes from scratch and adapting them to suit a range of tastes will land well with Haligonians.
