Melissa Kelly (chef)

Melissa Kelly is an American chef in Rockland, Maine in the United States. She received the 1999 and 2013 Best Chef in the Northeast honors in a James Beard Award. She co-founded Primo restaurant and is its executive chef preparing Italian cuisine and Mediterranean cuisine with a focus on local ingredients. She graduated first in class from the Culinary Institute of America and worked with Larry Forgione at An American Place and Alice Waters at Chez Panisse.
Chef Kelly owns and operates PRIMO Restaurants in Rockland, ME and in the JW Marriott Resort Grand Lakes in Orlando, FL. She re-opened her Orlando location in the fall of 2021 after an extensive renovation tracing back to her family roots in Puglia, Italy.