Yoji Masuda

Restaurant work came first. Yoji Masuda started in the day-to-day tempo of Local restaurants in Vancouver, Canada, where service, pacing, and repetition shape the craft before a chef’s name is ever on the door. He then moved into apprenticeship at Sushi Yoshitake in Ginza, Tokyo, Japan, a setting where sushi is built through precision, repetition, and close attention to detail. Those two settings — one rooted in the practical demands of restaurant service, the other in the structure of a traditional sushi apprenticeship — frame Yoji Masuda’s career. Today, as chef of Sushi Masuda, he brings that background into a single role shaped by training, discipline, and consistency.

Sushi is the focus at Sushi Masuda in Vancouver, Canada, and that narrow scope defines the restaurant’s identity. With sushi at the center, the work relies on clarity of intent and control of technique rather than breadth. In a city with a deepening appetite for exacting Japanese cuisine, Sushi Masuda sits in a lane where restraint and precision are the point.

Yoji Masuda’s honors include MICHELIN Guide Vancouver Young Chef Award (2024) and MICHELIN Guide Vancouver One Star for Sushi Masuda (2024). The first recognizes him individually; the second recognizes the work on the plate at Sushi Masuda. In 2024, those two distinctions aligned around the same kitchen, marking a year in which the restaurant’s sushi earned clear notice from the MICHELIN Guide Vancouver.