CINCINNATI — Jean-Robert de Cavel, a popular chef and restaurateur in Cincinnati, has died.
His family announced the award-winning chef passed away in his sleep Friday as a result of his five-year battle with leiomyosarcoma.
"Cincinnati will miss a wonderful, loving chef. But my daughter and I will miss our husband and dad the most," his wife, Annette de Cavel, said in a release.
de Cavel first arrived in Cincinnati in 1993 to become the executive chef at the Maisonette. After the restaurant closed, he stayed in the Queen City and transformed the region's culinary scene. His JR Group has been behind French Crust Cafe & Bistro, Le Bar a Boeuf, Frenchie Fresh, Restaurant L and Jean-Robert's Table.
"I'm proud to be a Cincinnatian," de Cavel said in a 2019 interview with WCPO. "The life of downtown, it wasn't what it is today. I was part of it. It's that beautiful evolution."
The French chef was diagnosed with leiomyosarcoma in 2018, but refused to let cancer slow him down. He continued to work at his restaurants. Though he did not talk publicly about his battle, de Cavel said in 2019 that his diagnosis reminded him the importance of living in the present.
"Things you always talk about, things you want to do, just do it and have fun with it," de Cavel said.
de Cavel and his wife also started The de Cavel Family SIDS Foundation after losing their first child, Tatiana, to sudden infant death syndrome. They created a scholarship fund in her honor to help students attending Midwest Culinary Institute.
Cincinnati honored its best-known chef on his 60th birthday in 2021, renaming 7th Street at the corner of 7th and Vine Jean-Robert de Cavel Way.
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