Memorial service held for award-winning restaurateur

SELBYVILLE, Del. -- An outdoor service Sunday will honor Sussex County restaurateur and James Beard award winner Matt Haley, who died in a motorcycle accident this summer in India.

Up to 2,000 people are expected at the 2 p.m. tribute at Freeman Stage at Bayside, which is slated to have live entertainment and food trucks.

Haley, who owned eight restaurants in the county, died Aug. 19. He was traveling through Northern India and Nepal on a six-week humanitarian trip when the motorcycle he was driving collided with a truck. He had planned to deliver stoves to a Nepal village.

The 53-year-old was having one of the best years of his professional life. A longtime philanthropist, Haley received the James Beard Foundation's 2014 Humanitarian of the Year Award for his work in Nepal and in Delaware.

Earlier this year, he also received the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation's Cornerstone Humanitarian Award and the International Association of Culinary Professionals' National Humanitarian Award.

"It is my hope, my prayer that all of us whose lives have been touched by Matt and by his unique and infectious humor and spirit will continue his remarkable lifetime of work," U.S. Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) said in a speech on the Senate floor last week.

The service will be streamed live on www.freemanstage.org.

The Matt Haley Companies' restaurants, operating under the SoDel Concepts umbrella, include Fish On in Lewes; Lupo di Mare and Papa Grande's Coastal Taqueria in Rehoboth; Matt's Fish Camp and Bluecoast Seafood Grill in Bethany Beach; Northeast Seafood Kitchen in Ocean View; and Catch 54 and the flagship Papa Grande's in Fenwick Island.