Calgary Food Scene: Expat Raves About Local Barbecue Boom

CALGARY, AB — A Calgary expat's month-and-a-half homecoming has turned into an accidental love letter to the city's culinary glow-up, with local barbecue joint Comery Block earning the kind of testimonial most restaurants would pay five figures for.

The Reddit user, who left Calgary a decade ago for Vancouver and last visited in 2019, returned expecting longer Seniore's lineups and worse Deerfoot traffic. What they didn't expect: a food scene that now rivals their adopted West Coast home—particularly in categories Vancouver can't touch.

The Fix That Wasn't Broken

Calgary's restaurant sector has been quietly printing money while the rest of the country tightens its belt. Alberta restaurant sales hit $1.1 billion in November 2025, up 7.7% year-over-year, with full-service spots leading the charge at 8.2% growth. That tracks with a January 2025 commercial real estate report pegging Calgary as the highest restaurant-spending growth market in Canada over the past five years—an annual 7.5% clip that makes Vancouver's sushi-or-bust scene look stagnant.

The player at the center of this particular conversion story: Comery Block, a barbecue operation that convinced a homesick Vancouverite to haul "several pounds of brisket and two sandwiches" across the Rockies. The testimonial hits different when you consider Vancouver's well-documented barbecue desert—a gap Calgary has methodically filled while West Coast diners were busy debating omakase menus.

The Boom Behind the Brisket

Calgary's food and beverage sector added a wave of new openings through 2025, particularly in West Calgary, with quick service, casual dining, and ethnic cuisines driving the build-out. That includes the Arab food and fried chicken joints that caught the visitor's eye—categories where Vancouver's inventory runs thin outside its Asian food stronghold.

The growth comes despite beef prices spiking 30% for some operators in 2025 and six out of ten Canadian restaurant owners reporting worse-than-expected profitability, per Restaurants Canada. Calgary's full-service restaurants apparently didn't get the memo, buoyed by Tourism Calgary's record-breaking 2025—visitor spending up 4% on the back of the G7 Summit, Stampede, and Rotary International Convention.

The Friction No One Ordered

The industry's margin squeeze is real. Restaurant food prices climbed 8.15% year-over-year in December, making it a leading inflation driver, while labour shortages persist despite Alberta's Tourism and Hospitality Stream immigration program launched in March 2024. Federal caps on low-wage foreign worker hiring—now limited to 10% of workforce—have tightened the staffing vise further.

But Calgary's operators are navigating the chaos better than most. The City of Calgary's downtown strategy, rolled out in January 2025, aims to turn Stephen Avenue into a pedestrian-friendly hub for retail and cafes. Calgary Economic Development continues pushing diversification, and the results are showing up in Reddit threads written by expats who left town before the city figured out how to smoke a proper brisket.

What's Next

The Comery Block superfan is already planning an Easter return trip. Whether that's a family visit with a barbecue pit stop or a barbecue pilgrimage with a family cameo remains unclear. Either way, Calgary's culinary reputation now travels west faster than the Deerfoot traffic moves south.