A MasterChef star has died after a months-long battle with brain cancer.
Mariusz Komenda was just 44 years old when he was rushed to hospital in January after a suspected stroke.
Thinking it would be a short-lived crisis, he was later told scans had found a tumour on the right thalamus, which sits above the brainstem.
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Doctors feared it could be a glioma, which can be malignant, so the MasterChef semi-finalist was rushed through for two major operations, radiotherapy and intensive rehabilitation.
News of his death was released by a local site that had followed his illness on Wednesday (7 Oct).
He became a household name on the eighth series of MasterChef Poland in 2019, reaching the semi-final and flying to Mexico with five other cooks for the overseas round.
He later came back to the TVN show as a guest and as a judge, and kept helping newer contestants.
In 2020, he opened Sztuka Restaurant in his hometown of Środa Śląska in south-west Poland.
In April this year, he and his son launched the restaurant Father & Son in the town centre, serving Mexican food.
Months later, the diagnosis landed and he called it the hardest fight of his life.
He wrote that life had seemed normal only months earlier, and that the news “sounded like a sentence”.
Doctors removed the glioma in the first operation and then treated the site with radiotherapy.
A second operation was needed, and surgeons took out a piece of skull bone to limit further complications.
He was under constant care at the State Medical Institute in Warsaw, and was also treated at the regional hospital in Legnica for other conditions found during the cancer checks.
A public appeal for travel, drugs, rehab and scans opened on 12 March with a target of about £31,000 (150,000 PLN).
Neighbours, local groups and fellow chefs held charity events as the bills mounted, as reported by Need To Know.
Series winner Grzegorz Zawierucha, a friend from the 2019 series, wrote: “Maniuś… I can’t manage to write anything. Goodbye, brother. See you. Prepare the most delicious dinner today, my friend.”
Fellow contestant Mateusz Krojenka said the news had wrecked him, and that he would remember Komenda’s infectious smile.
The MasterChef team said he had been part of the show’s family, and would be remembered for his passion, energy and love of cooking.
“It is hard to find words that could express our grief. Mariusz, we will miss you very much,” the production team wrote.
No funeral details have been released yet.
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