Rue Dumaine chef headed to NCR Country Club

Brian Griffey — chef de cuisine at Rue Dumaine and the top assistant to its award-winning co-founder Anne Kearney since the restaurant opened in 2007 — will leave Jan. 21 to take a position at NCR Country Club, Kearney announced this morning in an email to customers.

“With Chef Griffey by my side, we have managed to make many fantastic things happen in the food world of Dayton, Ohio, and we are both pretty pleased about that,” Kearney wrote. “It has been a pleasure to have him sharing the responsibilities of the kitchen and I so am pleased to have had his support as we made it happen through typical challenges of this industry. … I also know that NCR Country Club and its membership will benefit from his skill set, and for that I am pleased.”

Kearney said Rue Dumaine will highlight some of Griffey’s dishes over the next two weeks. The restaurant, which earlier this year trimmed its hours, is offering dinner service Wednesday through Saturday, Jan. 4-7 and Jan. 11-14.

Griffey honed his culinary skills alongside the most highly credentialed chef in Dayton history. In February 2016, Kearney was named a semifinalist by the James Beard Foundation for its “Best Chefs in America” competition for the Great Lakes region. It was the sixth consecutive year Kearney received the recognition. In each of those six years, Kearney was the only chef from the Dayton area to be named.

The James Beard Foundation Awards are regarded as the nation’s most prestigious recognition program for the food and beverage business — the equivalent of the Academy Awards of the restaurant industry.

The Beard Foundation recognized Rue Dumaine in 2008, naming it a semifinalist for the foundation’s “Best New Restaurant” in the nation. And Kearney was named a James Beard Foundation best-chef award winner in the southeastern U.S. in 2002 when she and her husband, Rue Dumaine co-owner Tom Sand, owned and operated Peristyle restaurant in New Orleans.

Kearney and Sand, both natives of the Dayton area, opened Rue Dumaine in 2007 at 1061 Miamisburg-Centerville Road (Ohio 725).

RELATED: Rue Dumaine’s Kearney scores ‘best-chef’ nomination for 6th year running

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