Illyanna Maisonet

illyanna Maisonet is the first Puerto Rican food columnist in the United States and the first Puerto Rican woman to win a James Beard award (2023). Her San Francisco Chronicle column, Cocina Boricua, focused on food throughout the Puerto Rican diaspora. She has hosted sold-out pop-up dinners across the San Francisco Bay Area. An IACP award winner for narrative food writing, she collaborated with José Andrés on Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story wrap party, contributed recipes to Rancho Gordo and has written for Bon Appetit, Saveur, Food & Wine, Los Angeles Times, Lucky Peach, Food52 and more. She has dedicated her career to documenting Puerto Rican recipes, including her family's, and preserving the Puerto Rican diaspora's disappearing foodways through rigorous, often bilingual research. She was also born and raised in Northern California where she still resides with her cats: Che, Chillón and Pavo. And Mami.