Custom-made carbohydrates are a popular dish at this year’s Winter Games. (Photo: olympics.com)
By Haley Scarpino
I’ve been watching the Olympics for the last couple of weeks. I’ve been captivated by the figure skaters, the women’s curling teams and the U.S. women’s hockey team, but I’m always looking beyond the ice rink to catch a glimpse of what the athletes are eating. Here are a few culinary tidbits I’ve discovered from the action in Italy.
Dining hall of fame
At the Olympic Village cafeteria, athletes can load up on pasta shaped like the Olympic rings. The pasta was custom-made for the 2026 Games and is served with a light Mediterranean-style sauce more typical of southern Italy. Social media is also flooded with posts about a molten lava cake (this year’s answer to the chocolate muffins that caught on at the Summer Games two years ago in Paris), the tiramisu and — my favorite — the Nutella pump.
Hail, Caesar!
My favorite discovery is that U.S. women’s hockey goalie Aerin Frankel has an Instagram account devoted entirely to Caesar salad. The page, @painbyromaine, is dedicated to the world’s perfect salad: crisp romaine, copious piles of Parm and, of course, the crouton. Each post includes star ratings and reviews assessing dressing distribution, anchovy presence, lettuce integrity and crouton count. The crown jewel is a post from Nov. 27, 2025, about a hot dog topped with Caesar salad and french fries — unhinged in the most delightful way.
Stanley sightings
The famous Italian-American actor and foodie Stanley Tucci seems to be everywhere at the Games. He narrated a portion of NBC’s opening ceremony coverage and has been spotted watching ice skating, rooting for the U.S. women’s hockey team and reporting on some of the region’s culinary specialties. He sips espresso and pastries, finds the best sandwich in Cortina, enjoys a skier’s breakfast and even hits a bar with Snoop Dogg. (Closer to home, you can find a life-size cardboard cut-out of him at Graziano Brothers grocery store here in Des Moines.)
Tucci has long been one of Italy’s most enthusiastic ambassadors and a true “stan” of its food. He’s written cookbooks that celebrate his heritage and brought viewers along for the ride in his CNN series “Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy,” a love letter to the country’s culinary landscape. At the Games, his presence feels like a reminder that the Olympics are about more than sports. They’re also about place, and few people capture its flavor quite like Tucci.
Il grande finale
If you’d like to taste a bit of the Games yourself, head to the closing-ceremony watch party from 1 to 3 p.m. Sunday at Exile Brewing Co. The get-together is hosted by the Iowa Partner State Program’s Veneto Committee, which honors the Italian state that includes both seaside Venice and tiny Cortina d’Ampezzo up in the Dolomite Mountains. Registration is encouraged.
During the Olympics, I love learning about the local culture as much as I love the competition, even if I only tune into curling once every four years. With Los Angeles up next in 2028, I’m already thinking about what will define those Games on the plate.
Haley Scarpino is a chef, home cook, recipe tester, food editor and graduate of the Iowa Culinary Institute. If she could win an Olympic medal, it would be for perfectly poached eggs.
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