Mama’s Boy is the go-to restaurant for breakfast and brunch in Athens, but the restaurants head chef has a secret. Reporter Kendall Meissner was able to find out just what that secret was.

That secret was deals with the c word- cancer. Most people don’t know about it and the chef, Colin Mayes, says that’s the way he wants it.

Colin Mayes is the mastermind behind the popular food at Mama’s Boy that has customers coming back week after week.

“Just to have built up this kind of Athens legacy out of the food is really awesome, so the chef really deserves props for that,” Mama’s Boy customer Abby Jessen said.

Flagpole has awarded Mama’s Boy favorite brunch four years in a row and favorite breakfast six years in a row, but what most customers do not know is that head chef Colin Mays was actually batteling two different types of cancer during that time.

“Found a lump on my left testicle and went and got it checked out and found out that’s what it was and then in the CT Scan that they did afterwards or you know when they were persuing it, they found the renal that was also in my left kidney,” Mama’s Boy head chef, Colin Mayes said.

After taking eight weeks off from work due to surgeries and doctor visits, Colin’s cancer was removed and he was able to move on with his life. After returning back to work, employees were excited to have him back where he belonged.

“He’s just a really great person all around. Just anytime you need something he’s always there for you. You know, he’s always there to help and make things a little better,” Mama’s Boy employee Ryan Peloquin said.

Colin makes sure to always make time for his family. Colin and his wife, Jamie are the proud parents of Harrison, Colin’s step-son, and their now nine in a half month old son, Charlie. Although Harrison may not be very interested in cooking, Colin thinks that Charlie might follow in his dad’s footsteps.

“He definately loves to eat food, so I do think that is proabably going to want to, I hold in my arms when Im cooking you know at home, so he is defiantely interested already, even though he can’t talk,” Colin Mayes said.

Colin is now cancer-free and continues to do what he loves.

“If I can beat cancer, I can pretty much do anything I want,” Colin Mayes said.

Colin never allowed cancer to stop him from doing what he loved. In fact, he doesn’t even really want people knowing about his battle with it. He told me about it half way through the interview and mentioned how he doesn’t want cancer to control his life or control how people view him.

Colin has been doing a good job at doing just that. In fact, he has been doing such a good job at moving on from that struggle in his life that he not only works at Mama’s Boy, but he also is the head chef at its sister restaurant Goodie Two Shoe that opened back in 2014.