Truffles Fine Foods will soon be serving up some tasty fare at Anvil Centre.
Nin Rai, owner of Truffles Fine Foods, said the new café in Anvil Centre will features some of the items now offered by his catering company.
“We will have soups, sandwiches, breakfast items, a special coffee, pastries, little bite-size canapés,” said Rai. “We have a lot of local fare. We don’t use any big suppliers. We try to support local as much as possible.”
Truffles Fine Foods café is expected to open within the next two months.
“We are hoping for February, but I think it’s going to be late February or March,” Rai told The Record. “We are ordering equipment and special tiles in.”
Truffles Fine Foods will be open at 33 Eighth St., across from the SkyTrain station and next to the entrance to the office tower. It’s expected to be open 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. most days, with later openings anticipated in the summer.
Truffles Fine Foods at Anvil Centre will be similar to its café at VanDusen Gardens in Vancouver.
In addition to operating the café in Anvil Centre, the city also awarded the catering contract for Anvil Centre to Truffles Fine Foods. It’s been catering events at the facility since the fall.
“It’s been busy,” Rai said. “Big gatherings, small gatherings, all sorts of stuff from like 15-person coffee breaks to 500 persons nighttime events. It’s been quite busy there.”
Rai estimates Truffles has catered about 15 events since Anvil Centre opened in September 2014.
“It’s been really good. I think the reception has been fantastic. Everyone has been happy with the services, the food,” he said. “I think the package is really nice. It’s a beautiful building in itself. For New Westminster, it’s a great location. I think it’s going to do well. It’s going to take a little bit of time to get the word out there, but I think it will be a regular stop in conventions.”
Truffles, which was the official caterer of the Whistler Canada House during the 2010 Winter Olympics, caters all kinds of gatherings, including galas, weddings and the Live at Squamish festival. It also runs Truffles Café at VanDusen and has served some of Hollywood’s biggest stars when they’re filming in Vancouver.
Rai is excited about his company’s newest opportunity in New Westminster.
“We love it. Obviously it is growing, there is a lot of change going on. We are really happy about that,” he said. “The building is beautiful. The city has been fantastic to work with. Everyone at the Anvil Centre has been really great to work with. We are definitely looking forward to it. We think we are going to do very well there.”
Rai said his company had to hire two or three extra staff to help out with its Anvil Centre operations and will hire another seven or eight people for the café.
“You’d be surprised at how many it takes to get a location like that going,” he said. “You want to get the right service levels.”
Rai, who founded his catering company in 2005, also started L’Abattoir, a restaurant in Gastown.
“We’re very excited to welcome Truffles Café into the downtown. Along with other local businesses, Truffles will provide yet another option for Anvil Centre event and conference attendees that provide a boost to our local economy,” said Blair Fryer, the city’s manager of economic development and communications. “We’re proud to have them in the city.”
