Success Stories

2003 - 2004

Ben Cote,
Cassis Restaurant

Affordable French Cuisine - an oxymoron to most of us - but a vision and now a reality for Chef, Ben Cote, owner of Cassis Restaurant - the hottest new restaurant on the Vancouver culinary scene!

From cooking his own breakfast at age six, Ben has had a lifelong passion and interest in food. His formal training began at 15, when he enrolled in a one year course with Vancouver Community College. He then apprenticed with some of Canada's Top Chef's including: Robert Sulaticky and Michael Noble of Diva at the Met. He began his own catering company starting as a personal chef and quickly grew the business from one-on-one catering to creating very high end, vacuum packed boil-in-the-bag food for his clients.

After dabbling in real-estate and opening a concept restaurant 'Provencal' it was only a matter of time before Ben opened his own restaurant; combining his culinary expertise and business experience in one fell swoop. He enrolled in The Self-Employment Equity Program at Toward Excellence and with their help, began to realize his vision of serving French food as the French eat it; affordable meals, full off flavour without excess. He bought an existing restaurant and carried out a full renovation for his opening on August 7th, 2004. The restaurant has been a resounding success from that first day; creating a buzz that has resulted in well over twenty write-up's and so many awards Ben doesn't know where to put them all. His next vision is to become more visible to the public and the media. With this in mind he has already accepted an invitation to be one of the celebrity chefs in a charity cook off for the 'Make A Wish Foundation'.

His biggest lesson has been to stay focused on the dream - knowing that when he does he can achieve anything. Visit Cassis to sample the best French food in Vancouver! However, it is a good idea to call ahead for a reservation!

Cassis Restaurant
420 W.Pender
Vancouver, BC
Phone: 604-605-0420
Email: ben@cassisvancouver.com
Website: www.cassisvancouver.com

Read his listing in the directory. Ben was 2005 Entrepreneur of the Year. Read his media coverage.