Cuchillo Restaurant

Stuart Irving admits he was a bit of a bad boy in high school. "I bounced around from school to school and I kind of became a Scarlett Letter with the principals," he quips. "But I always loved cooking classes because that's where the hot girls were." It seemed this rebellious charmer was a natural in the kitchen. "After high school, I started working as a dishwasher and really feel in love with the restaurant atmosphere,” he adds.

Deciding to get serious about the art of cooking, Stuart enrolled in the culinary program at Vancouver Community College. Like a long list of chefs before him, he paid his dues working up the food chain at some of the city's top restaurants – including Star Anise, Salmon House on the Hill and Raintree – before opening his own culinary venture.

Stuart launched his first restaurant, Spanish tapas bar Cobre, on Powell Street in 2007. When the landlord took over the Gastown building in 2012, Stuart reinvented himself and opened Cuchillo in a larger space just two blocks east.

“Cuchillo’s dishes are more my personality, which is to say they are a little edgier,” Stuart explains. Drawing on his passion for Latin-inspired cuisine, Stuart's bold and savoury take on classic south-of-the-border dishes was influenced in part by his marriage to a Mexican woman. "We traveled through Central and South America and I just fell in love with Latino food," he says simply.