I read an article that convinced me I should attend Super Bowl Sunday LIV just for the food. Dayanny De La Cruz, executive chef for Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium has delicious menu plans for the 60,000 football fans this weekend. Her style is influenced by her Dominican childhood combined with her culinary degree from Grand Rapids, Michigan.

At 47, the first female Super Bowl head chef oversees a staff of 2500 people. Meals will be prepared in the seven arena kitchens and five to ten mobile kitchens beginning two days before the game. On Sunday, she will be on site at 2:30 am! De La Cruz is not a stranger to difficult challenges. An ovarian cancer survivor, in remission eight years, she enjoys the support of her home family and work family to do her utmost in the career she loves; hospitality and food.

Let’s talk about the menu and the specialty items for the Super Bowl suites. We’ll begin with fried yucca and plantains, guacamole, compressed watermelon, and empanadas. For fish-lovers, there will be sushi, lobster tail, ceviche (fish, onion, tomato, cilantro and lemon mix), paella, shrimp cocktail and tuna salads. For the heavy hitters, there will be beef tenderloin, skirt steak, BBQ pulled pork, Argentine asado (BBQ), short ribs, lamb skewers and Cuban sausage sandwiches. For desert, cake pops, gourmet donuts, and mojito or guava-and-cheese paletas (popsicles). All this is in addition to the traditional concession stand fare.

Do the 20,000 pounds of shrimp, 8,000 pounds of short ribs and 2,000 pounds of beef tenderloin to be delivered to the stadium sound like a recipe for food waste? The Chef has it covered. Leftovers will be donated to Food Rescue Miami. Dayanny De La Cruz has a close relationship with their organization to ensure excess food gets to people who need it.

I wish Chef De La Cruz the best of luck in her heroic endeavor. May she get the kitchen equivalents of a touchdown and the field goal. I hope she scores more than a photo op moment to chat with halftime performers Jennifer Lopez and Shakira over café and paletas…

Thanks to Repeating Islands for inspiring this post.

Gracias for reading Fake Flamenco! ¡Olé! –Rebecca