For parents who've experienced that uniquely soul-sucking genre of eatery known as the family restaurant, Munch is as noteworthy for what it isn't as what it is.

To start, there is not a chicken strip or French fry on the premises; Rachel Dempster, who co-owns the Lynn Valley spot with her husband, Ross, banned deep fryers from the open kitchen. There are no jungle gyms, video games, or token crayons for colouring printouts of chain-restaurant mascots. And it's nowhere near as loud as you might think: the Euro-modular, natural-wood play area is a spacious 1,000 square feet and has recycled-rubber flooring that absorbs sound.

Most surprising of all, instead of dead-eyed parents staring off into space and wondering where it all went wrong, there are couples sipping away on Chilean Cabernet; stabbing at aesthetically pleasing towers of tomato, arugula, and mozzarella; and having real, live adult conversations.

Put another way, when was the last time you went to a family restaurant and ordered something with truffle mascarpone in it?

It's a concept the Dempsters concocted after realizing there was a huge void. Parents of an “almost-six-year-old” girl and an “almost-four-year-old” boy, she's from London, he's Scottish, and they like to eat out. “I wanted a place where if my baby cried for five minutes, everybody wasn't looking at me,” Rachel tells the Straight in a phone interview. “I felt I was bringing this awful alien in with me. And kids aren't programmed to sit in a restaurant.”

But she also wanted good food.

The couple opened the space as a play café called Babyeats just over a year ago, but when they finally scored a liquor licence this past June, they renovated and launched a full menu designed by Chambar and Lucy Mae Brown alumnus Mook Sutton, one that emphasizes fresh, local ingredients—think West Coast by way of the Mediterranean.

Ross is a film-set designer, and that's where the simple, modern look of the place comes in. A castle playhouse made of wood with a red-and-white-canvas roof towers at the centre of the room. Other tasteful touches include a big white cuckoo clock, wood panels etched with one of the Dempster children's drawings, and a gigantic blackboard.

All of which brings us to the true test: a visit with our two boys—one a toddler who's officially been banned by well-known restaurants and two major airlines. I've seen waiters carrying gigantic sushi trays gingerly step over him while he pretends to be passed out on the floor; I've seen him bring Commercial Drive's Little Nest café to silence with an extended, Velociraptorlike screech; I've seen a certain ice-cream-shop vender bend down, look him in the eye, and school him proper with “Do you mind?!” More polite folks refer to him with such euphemisms as “high-energy” and “active”.

Munch has brunch and lunch menus, but that'd be too easy: where they really get ambitious is with a sophisticated dinner menu—the witching hour even for well-behaved children.

Entering the eating area, we were happy to score one of the last of four distressed-brown-leather booths—all of which open onto a play area that's cordoned off with a subtle low fence. Not that the boys were ready to sit down: they had discovered the impressive array of Italian- and French-design wooden trucks and cranes.

Normally family restaurants are all about getting in and out quickly. Don't do Munch on an evening when you're in a rush: with kids' set menus for $9.99 and adults' entrées $14 to $23, you'll want to enjoy it. Mercifully, the kids' meals (a so-so organic turkey dog and a toddler-approved black-bean-and-corn quesadilla) came within 15 minutes, at the same time as our appetizers. Our kids were just as happy to pick away at our artful antipasto platter, complete with white asparagus wrapped in prosciutto and deliciously nutty olives. (Munch will soon beef up the kids' menu to include pastas to share; adults will see choices expand to include everything from Cornish game hens to duck.)

The herb-crusted goat cheese and fig salad with honey-walnut-infused vinaigrette was our first taste of how well chef Caillin Brown, a 27-year-old rising star whose résumé includes Deep Cove's Arms Reach Bistro, plays with textures and layers flavour. As for the wine list, it's small but well edited, and the Dempsters have thought out every detail, including the fact that glass tumblers are safer around kids than stemmed glassware.

By the time your entrée comes, your kids are elbow-deep in the vanilla ice cream with chocolate chips they get with their meal, and then they're ready to head to the play area again. We shared a penne with house-made chorizo that had just enough spicy kick, set off by the sweetness of the garden-fresh cherry tomatoes and the sharpness of shaved Parmesan. But the highlight was one of Munch's signature tarte flambée puff-pastry pizzas, topped with a mix of mushrooms and impossibly rich truffle mascarpone, capped by crisp fresh spinach and drizzled with balsamic. It tasted so sinful that it magnified the indulgent sensation of the evening—that surreal “I can't believe I'm actually enjoying my food without my kids bugging me” feeling.

And the two-year-old terrorist? Unbelievable. He was busy in a back corner, serving up wooden vegetables to some imaginary houseguests.

By raiding the reading nook, we managed to get through our dessert, a layered sculpture of roasted apple slices and puff pastry, topped by ice cream and caramel sauce—comfy and contemporary, just like the restaurant.

It was around this time that a group of three adults—without kids—came into the restaurant saying they were “Caillin fans”. Granted, they opted to sit outside on the beautiful courtyard patio adorned with edible herbs and flowers. That was the final seal of approval: food lovers choosing to go to a family restaurant—even when they didn't have to.