The LA Galaxy’s Chef Grows His Ingredients Right at the Stadium

For Chef Morgan Bunnell, feeding a full roster of LA Galaxy soccer players, many with dietary restrictions or special nutritional needs, is no walk in the park. So he decided to produce many of his ingredients right on the team’s home turf at the StubHub Center in the very urban setting of Carson. The Los Angeles Times recently profiled Chef Burnell and his efforts to go hyper local with much of his fare.

“Located just off the stadium concourse where the Galaxy and Los Angeles Chargers play their home games, the StubHub Center’s garden isn’t something sports fans would notice on their walk from the box office to their seats. It’s nestled just beyond some concession stands through a nondescript gate, hiding away rows of planters of budding produce like peppers, strawberries, Swiss chard, tomatoes, beets, spinach, artichokes, corn, carrots and even hops planted by LA Galaxy and StubHub center employees on their own time.

The StubHub Center joins a budding group of pro sports arenas farming produce on site. In Santa Clara, the 49ers’ Levi’s Stadium is growing greens and herbs on its rooftop garden. The Boston Red Sox have Fenway Farms, another rooftop produce project, at Fenway Park.

“’We have all of this space here, and now that we have our chef for the Galaxy, he was really into gardening, it made a lot of sense,’ says Katie Pandolfo, the stadium’s general manager, who had the initial idea to build the garden. ‘We have a lot of employees here who live in apartments who didn’t have the opportunity to garden at home, so to have the opportunity at work is pretty incredible.’”

You can read more about Chef Burnell, his garden and food program here.