17 New Recipients of Michelin Awards & Young Chef Award for Wildlight’s Warren Chow

Vancouver is officially home to 77 Michelin-rated restaurants, and this week the list grew by a total of 17 restaurants, up from 60 in last year’s inaugural local edition, and comprises 21 types of cuisine. 

The prestigious guide added one new Michelin-starred dining establishment to its 2023 roster at a ceremony held at Fairmont Pacific Rim. Other local highlights include more value-centric Bib Gourmand rankings and several new Recommended dining establishments.  

The selection of Okeya Kyujiro, headed by chef Takuya Matsuda, which specializes in omakase (which translates loosely as “let the chef decide”), brings the city’s total of One Star restaurants to nine, with eight returning from the 2022 ranking.  

The returning One Star restaurants are AnnaLena (“impeccably prepared dishes”), Barbara, the charming Burdock & Co, Published on Main, iDen & QuanJuDe, Kissa Tanto (Japanese-Italian fusion), Masayoshi (premium sushi), and St. Lawrence, with its “rustic and hearty” French-Canadian fare.  

Michelin quantifies one star as being “high-quality cooking, worth a stop.” One star is the highest level given out in Vancouver to date. The guide describes two stars as “excellent cooking, worth a detour,” while three stars mean “exceptional cuisine, worth a special journey.” 

New & Notable to the Bib Gourmand Category

The Michelin inspectors added five restaurants to the Bib Gourmand category, which recognizes great food at a great value: Farmer’s Apprentice (a “true neighbourhood gem”) Karma Indian Bistro (“wonderfully delicious traditional dishes interspersed with bold, innovative plates”), Motonobu Udon (with noodles cut fresh to order), the elegant Seaport City Seafood, and Sushi Hil (“Chef Hil Nguy craft his jewel-like pieces with great care and efficiency”). 

Returning Bib Gourmand restaurants are Anh and Chi, Chupito, Fable Kitchen, Fiorino, Italian Street Food, Kin Kao Song, Little Bird Dim Sum + Craft Beer, Lunch Lady, Nightshade, Magari by Oca, Phnom Penh, Say Mercy!, and Vij’s.  

This Year’s Special Awards

Okeya Kyujiro’s front-of-house team won Vancouver’s 2023 Service Award.  

The Young Chef Award, a first for Vancouver, went to Warren Chow of Wildlight Kitchen & Bar. The restaurant near UBC is the inaugural foray of the Pattison Group in the restaurant sector.  

The award for Exceptional Cocktails went to Max Curzon-Price of Suyo Modern Peruvian, while Kelcie Jones of Burdock & Co. won the Sommelier award. 

“The famously anonymous MICHELIN Guide inspectors once again were impressed with the culinary community here,” said Gwendal Poullennec, the International Director of the MICHELIN Guides. “This sort of steady growth is what we often see in second-year selections, and it is definitely a harbinger of great things to come. We are very proud of the passionate chefs and restaurant teams here in Vancouver, and they make their city very proud.” 

There are just 3,000 Michelin-ranked restaurants in the world. The guide, named after the “tyre” company, dates back to 1889. 

This EcoLuxLifestyle.co story was contributed by Joanne Peters.