Canadian Geoduck and cherry tomato salad

Chef Quang Dang began his culinary career at West, where he worked as junior Sous Chef. For the next five years, while working his way ever-upward in some of Vancouver’s finest kitchens, Quang quickly established himself as an advocate of sustainability and a champion of West Coast cuisine, a role that he continues to undertake in defining his approach to modern cookery. Raised in Calgary, Alberta with family roots that stretch back to Scotland and the orchards and rice fields of Vietnam, Chef Dang originally moved to Vancouver in 1998 to finish his engineering degree and fulfill a dream to train for the Olympics with Canada’s national field hockey team. Part-time positions in the hospitality industry soon won him over, however, and his culinary career began in earnest. Quang went on to compete in a number of international food competitions such as the Bocuse D’Or in Lyon France, the National Chaîne des Rôtisseurs in Winnipeg and most recently represented Canadian cuisine at the 2011 European Seafood Exposition in Brussels, the largest of its kind. Quang returned ‘home’ to West as Executive Chef in September, 2011: “I’m thrilled to be back,” he says, “and now to lead one of the finest culinary and service brigades in the country.”