Former Minneapolis chef Remy Pettus dies at 41

Chefs from across the country are paying tribute to former Minneapolis chef Remy Pettus, 41, who died suddenly over the weekend from cardiac arrest, according to a family Facebook post.

“His spirit reminds me to go big or go home and that everything I need I already have,” chef Ramaj Ceciley, who worked with Pettus in Minneapolis, posted on social media.

Pettus graduated from Southwest High School in Minneapolis and earned a culinary arts degree from the Culinary Institute of America. He honed his craft at several prestigious restaurants around the country, eventually returning to Minneapolis, where he worked at Cosmos before serving as the opening chef at downtown’s Eastside.

His professional work culminated at Bardo, the E. Hennepin Avenue restaurant Pettus opened in 2018 to critical acclaim (now the home of All Saints). The restaurant was known for its passionate commitment to local ingredients, elevating even the humblest of side dishes in a way the Star Tribune praised as “adventurous and artful.” Pettus, the review continued, “constantly demonstrates skills learned during his tenure in two highly influential kitchens: Chicago’s former Moto, which might have ranked as the nation’s most playful molecular gastronomy laboratory, and Charlie Palmer’s Dry Creek Kitchen in Napa Valley.”

Bardo closed in September 2020, a casualty of the pandemic. “It was my life’s work and I am devastated,” Pettus said at the time. But he again found a way to marry his passions for music and food as executive chef at the Dakota, Minneapolis’ iconic restaurant and concert venue.

In early 2023, Pettus announced he would be leaving the Dakota for a job he said restored him: writing. “There are only two universal languages between strangers that cannot be misunderstood. They are music and food.”

He then moved from Minneapolis to Raleigh, N.C., to be closer to his family. Funeral arrangements are pending.