Celebrity chef Sandra Lee, 59, has called off her engagement to her longtime partner, actor Ben Youcef, 45. Lee’s publicist, Jennifer Abel, confirmed the split to the media on Wednesday. The duo was first linked in March 2021 after meeting at a charity event in California and were engaged only a few months later in August. “Meeting Ben was incredible. It was the perfect intersection of timing and chemistry. I hadn’t been intimate in years and years,” Lee described their relationship to Us Weekly in 2024. “I literally felt like a virgin at 55, and I just didn’t want to get involved again. He waited and persisted, and here we are,” she added. Rumors began circulating about their split earlier this year after Lee was photographed without her engagement ring. The Food Network star also avoided questions from TMZ about when the age-gap couple planned to tie the knot. Lee was previously linked to disgraced former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whom she dated for 15 years. Youcef was previously married to realtor Apryl Stephenson, mother of their two children, until their 2020 divorce.
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