Kevin O'Donnell
Executive Chef | SRV | Boston
September 2020
Before they were friends, chefs, and business partners, Kevin O’Donnell was growing up in Rhode Island while Michael Lombardi spent his childhood down the road in New Haven, Connecticut. From a young age, O’Donnell was eager to get cooking. In 2004, he enrolled at Johnson & Wales, and, after earning his degree, he too travelled to Orvieto, interning at Ristorante Zeppelin and meeting Lombardi. O’Donnell briefly returned to Rhode Island to cook at the Castle Hill Inn before returning to Ristorante Zeppelin as sous chef. Two years later, O’Donnell relocated to New York City for the opportunity to work at Del Posto.
By 2011, Lombardi and O’Donnell had teamed up and were off to Paris to help open lauded restaurant L’Office. In 2012, the two briefly parted ways for Lombardi to join Chef Justin Hilbert’s team at Gwynnett St. in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and O’Donnell to become executive chef of Boston’s The Salty Pig. After years of developing a concept for a Venetian-inspired bacaro restaurant and wine bar and with the help of The Salty Pig owner, Jim Cochener, they opened SRV in 2016. The eatery won Boston Magazine’s “Best Italian Restaurant” two years in a row and was named a semifinalist for the James Beard Awards’ “Best New Restaurant.”
