Home Downtown Vancouver Hotels Vancouver’s Westin Bayshore Hotel Westin Bayshore Hotel’s H Tasting Lounge Restaurant (and Winterlust) Winterlust Domed Dining at the Westin Bayshore’s H Tasting Lounge Restaurant

Winterlust Domed Dining at the Westin Bayshore’s H Tasting Lounge Restaurant

Winterlust at H Tasting Lounge

Winterlust is a unique, outdoor, domed-dining experience at the H Tasting Lounge which is a restaurant at the Westin Bayshore Hotel, Vancouver.

Lunches and dinners on the patio at H Tasting Lounge in winter feature exquisite food and fancy drinks in your own exclusive, Nordic-style, wood-and-glass dome that seats up to six people. It’s an exceptional culinary experience.

Winterlust returns to the H Tasting Lounge patio at The Westin Bayshore from November 5th, 2025. Each dome has private climate control, festive decorations, sliding glass doors, and a curved seating area for up to six. The experience is perfect for cozy Christmas-themed lunches or evening celebrations.

Earlier this Spring, the Westin Bayshore also hosted The Secret Garden, which is similar but with a spring theme. The Secret Garden also takes place in the glass domes on the restaurant’s outdoor patio. It ran from March 5th until May 11th, 2025 (with the last day of the season being Mother’s Day). Details and confirmation for this event, scheduled to happen again in 2026, are pending.

Visit the H Tasting Lounge website or continue reading for details about the restaurant and its Winterlust dining experience. Visit the H2 Kitchen website to learn about the other restaurant at the Westin Bayshore Hotel.

Winterlust Domed Dining in Vancouver

The H Tasting Lounge offers special dining options at select times of the year. During the colder months of the fall and winter, guests can enjoy Winterlust. It involves private service in glass domes on the restaurant’s outdoor patio. Located at the Westin Bayshore in Vancouver, Winterlust offers a unique dining experience and fine cuisine.

Each dome has wooden panels, floor-to-ceiling glass windows and Nordic-themed decorations. Instead of regular chairs for seats, there are cozy cushions, pillows and blankets. The domes are also equipped with sliding doors, fresh air circulation and heaters. There’s no need to worry about the weather. Each dome has its own set of music speakers as well which guests can control using a touchscreen tablet. Winterlust is a private, luxurious and comfortable dining experience for you and up to five friends.

The H Tasting Lounge is one of two restaurants at the Westin Bayshore Hotel. The other one is the H2 Kitchen + Bar which is also a great place for food and drinks. Both places serve a wide range of menu options. The H2 Kitchen focuses a bit more on meat (including barbecued and smokehouse meats), while the H Tasting Lounge specializes a bit more on seafood.

See the H Tasting Lounge website for full details about Winterlust, and to make reservations.

Hours and Reservations in 2025

The 2025–26 Winterlust season brings back the beloved dome dining tradition at H Tasting Lounge. Winterlust operates daily from 11:30 am to 12:00 am from November 5th, 2025, through the winter season.

Each dome seats up to six people. Guests enjoy private service, full menu access, and climate-controlled comfort. The experience is quite a treat. Inviting guests to indulge in modern coastal cuisine while overlooking Coal Harbour’s sparkling waterfront.

Unlike guests sitting inside the main H Tasting Lounge or H2 Kitchen + Bar restaurants, there’s a minimum spending amount for all Winterlust guests. Excluding taxes and tips, Domes carry a minimum spend per dome of $150 for weekday lunch (Monday to Friday), $200 for weekend lunch (Saturday and Sunday), $200 for evening bookings Sunday to Thursday, and $250 for Friday and Saturday evenings.

Guests can reserve online. Each group can stay and dine for up to 2.5 hours from the start of their reservation. It’s worth noting that cancellations within 48 hours incur a $75-per-person fee.

Visit the H Tasting Lounge website for full details about Winterlust.

Our Winterlust Dining Experience

We had lunch at Winterlust in late November last season, and it was wonderful, memorable, and delicious all at once. If you want to spoil yourself and your family, friends, a date, or other loved ones, this is the place to do it.

Three of us had lunch together when we went. Upon arrival we were shown to our own private dome. It was romantic and exotic. It was cozy, in a warm, comfortable way, with ample space for six people.

Below is a description of some of the foods and drinks we had for lunch at Winterlust. (Note: Menu items and other details are subject to change. When you go, it might be the same, or it might be different.)

Our Winterlust Drinks

As soon as we arrived, the waiter gave us our menus. We got a detailed description about the various exotic drinks available, which, for the Christmas season, had a terrifically original holiday shopping mall theme. The drinks themselves were an experience.

One of us had the Double Feature which was a rum-based cocktail that came in a movie theatre-style takeout box with pretzels and popcorn. Another had the Advent Calendar which was a vodka, Grand Marnier, ginger and cranberry cocktail that came with its own miniature Christmas tree with lights for the table. The third person in our party had the Barbados Bombshell from the “lingerie store.” It was a 2 oz. cocktail with Barbados rum, passionfruit liqueur, white chocolate, scotch bonnet and a giant smoking bubble on top. All of the drinks were delicious.

Towards the end of our lunch, we ordered the mulled wine which came in a fancy, brass-looking contraption that heated the drink and siphoned it from one chamber to another. The apparatus looked like a combination of an antique chemistry science experiment tool and a drink-making machine you might see in a Harry Potter movie. It was really cool, and the mulled wine was tasty.

On the Winterlust cocktail menu it said it was a “festive cocktail experience that is one part wacky, two parts festive and 100% unforgettable.” Our drinks and the experience were indeed all three.

See the H Tasting Lounge website for full details about Winterlust, and to make reservations.

Our Winterlust Lunch Menu Items

Whereas our drinks were wacky and delicious, our food at Winterlust was both beautifully presented and exquisite.

As an appetizer, we had the grilled octopus. It came in a Thai coconut curry sauce with shiitake mushrooms. It was very nice. Probably the best grilled octopus we have ever had. We also had the house-made milk buns with brown honey butter. They too were very tasty.

For our main entrées, one of us had the 5 oz. grass-fed tenderloin steak frites. The other two people in our group shared the Chilled Seafood Tower. It included Dungeness crab legs, tiger prawns, clams, mussels, a smoked trout dip, albacore tuna tataki, and a few other items. It was both a sight to see and a treat to eat.

Other Lunch and Dinner Menu Items

Other lunchtime menu options that we could have ordered included a roasted cauliflower steak, chicken schnitzel, steelhead trout, a seafood ‘nduja bucatini pasta or an HTL Smash Burger. For the experience, the quality of the restaurant and what you got, the entrée prices all seemed quite reasonable.

Lunch and dinner menus at Winterlust are similar, but slightly different. Most menu items are the same, but in some cases the portion sizes are different. Also, when we went, steelhead trout was on the lunch menu, whereas for dinner it was sablefish instead. Other than that, most other things were the same. The restaurant also offers a special menu for kids under 12.

See the H Tasting Lounge website for full details about menu options.

Chocolate Dome Dessert — Chocolate Dome at Winterlust

Our H Tasting Lounge Dessert Menu

To finish off our Winterlust experience we went for the Chocolate Dome. It was delicious and decadent. The Chocolate Dome was beautiful. It was shaped like a large dome, just like the Winterlust wood-and-glass one we were having lunch in. The dessert came with a hammer which you used to break the dome (the chocolate one, not the glass one). Inside was an exquisite chocolate mousse.

In addition to the house-made chocolate outer shell and dark chocolate mousse inside, the plate was decorated with pistachio moss, meringue mushrooms, chocolate twigs and berries. The dessert was a dream to eat (both at Winterlust and at home the next day). The dome was also fun to smash open with the small wooden hammer. It took a surprising number of tries.

Other dessert menu items we could have chosen included a dessert platter and an HTL Affogato (a burnt honey ice cream with an almond tuile biscuit and espresso). Other options were Doughnuts & Cotton Candy (with whipped cream and fresh berries), a Calamansi Tart (which has a mix of vanilla, raspberry and pistachio flavours), and a Nougat Semifreddo (which is made with nuts, candied fruit, honey chantilly and other ingredients).

Of the dessert menu items, the Chocolate Dome and Dessert Platter were the two most extravagant, each over $50. They both served far more than just one person. The other options cost either $14 or $16 last year.

See the H Tasting Lounge website for full details about Winterlust.

Winterlust Video

Check out the video below for a good idea of what to expect at the H Tasting Lounge’s Winterlust event. The video includes footage from our visit. As you can see, the domes are on the restaurant’s outdoor patio. They are beautifully decorated, private and very cozy. The food is also both fancy and delicious.

Tips & Advice

The following suggestions will help you make the most of your Winterlust experience. The first few are about the restaurant specifically. After that, we provide a few extra tips about other topics.

TIP #1: The Winterlust menus are the same as the regular lunch and dinner menus at H Tasting Lounge. The difference is that with Winterlust there are minimum spend requirements.

TIP #2: A valid credit card is required to secure your reservation. Winterlust has a 48-hour cancellation policy — cancellations or no-shows within that window incur a $75 per person fee.

TIP #3: If money is a concern, go for lunch on a weekday with a party of six (so you can split the lower minimum spend among more people). Plus, if you go between 3:00 pm and 5:00 pm, some items might be available at Happy Hour pricing.

TIP #4: Both the H Tasting Lounge and H2 Kitchen + Bar are excellent restaurants at the Westin Bayshore Hotel. The former specializes in seafood and cocktails while the latter specializes in barbecued and smoked meats. The H2 Kitchen also has great weekend brunches, especially on special occasions like Easter and Mother’s Day. Both restaurants also have good deals during their Happy Hours.

Other Things to Keep in Mind

TIP #1: Winterlust is lovely. Do it if you can. It’s a dining experience you’ll remember for a long time.

TIP #2: If you are looking for a place to stay in downtown Vancouver, the Westin Bayshore Hotel is great. We’ve stayed there a couple of times, for staycations, and loved it. It’s highly recommended. Their outdoor pool is especially nice. The hotel is a resort, and it feels like one. Click Our Westin Bayshore Winter Staycation to learn about our experience.

TIP #3: Before or after your Winterlust experience, go for a walk along the Coal Harbour Seawall. It’s a beautiful area that stretches from Stanley Park to Canada Place. During the winter there are also light displays and installations to see as part of Destination Downtown.