Tag: Curve Ball

Our OmahaNebraska.com Line Up of CWS Food Offerings at the College World Series 2026

The CWS 2026 Media Tasting showcased many new offerings and some updated classics.

The Banh Mi Smash Burger is one of the newest burgers on the menu. For the smash burger portion, it features two beef patties topped with white American cheese. For the banh mi portion, there is fried pork belly tossed in gochujang sauce, along with pickled vegetables, cilantro, and Kewpie mayo. The flavors blended together well and complemented the burger. It was very good.

The Bavarian Dog is a beef hotdog covered with crisp bacon and honey mustard pretzel pieces nestled in a pretzel bun. Dripping in beer cheese sauce, it was a big hit and crowd-pleaser.

The Elote Nacho boat was my personal favorite. A gentle river of queso blanco and lime crema, topped with cotija cheese, cilantro, and fire-roasted corn, flows over a bed of tortilla chips. The combination of flavors was an outstanding winning combination for me. I’ve never had a sauce pair so perfectly with chips before.

The Grand Slam Nacho is a returning and updated fan favorite. Its corn tortilla chip base is loaded with queso blanco, beef, and green onions. Bringing it all together for a home run of flavor are fire-roasted salsa and cilantro lime crema.

The Nashville Hot Tenders are large breaded chicken tenders covered in a spicy Nashville hot sauce that is sure to bring the heat. The lightly seasoned tater tots provide balance to the cayenne-heavy sauce with the tangy pickle slices as the perfect complement.

The Out of the Parm Burger was a surprise favorite for me. It is really two sandwiches in one. On the bottom is a traditional hamburger. Above it roosts the best chicken Parmesan I have ever had. It was tender and flavorful, with the right amount of cheese and a thin layer of sauce. A layer of banana peppers, along with the bun and a necessary skewer, helps tie everything together.

The Steakhouse Mac N Cheese is a three-cheese version with a surprise cheese-blue cheese. The steak bites go well with the blue cheese crumbles and fried onion. Green onions dot the creation.

The Tag Up Tortellini is one of Chef Katie Cochran’s and my favorites. The base is fried cheese tortellini, and its teammates are Italian sausage bites, mozzarella,  cupped pepperoni, and Parmesan cheese, all served with marinara sauce.

The Texas Leaguer Sausage is sure to become a new favorite. Tasty smoked barbecue brisket, barbecue sauce, and caramelized onions cover a Black Forest bacon sausage for an out-of-the-park flavor experience.

The Comeback Smash Burger is one of the newest smash burger offerings. It comes on a branded “College World Series Omaha” bun and features two beef patties, American cheese, lettuce, red onion, a thick slice of heirloom tomato, and comeback sauce. It’s a smash hit for sure and will make you want to come back for another.

The Curve Ball is another burger served on one of the branded buns. The brioche bun is shaped and stamped to resemble a baseball. Enclosed inside are a grilled beef patty, two slices of American cheese, dill pickles, and house-made burger sauce. The closed bun keeps the burger and toppings safely tucked away until the first bite.

And now for dessert….

The Midwest Monster Twinkie is so massive you’ll need some friends to help you vanquish it.  While it looks and is huge, the doughy part is incredibly light and airy. Dripped copiously with chocolate and heaping helpings of delicious strawberry compote, the toppings are the heaviest part of the confectionery creature. Oh yes, let’s not forget a light white fluffy expected surprise inside.

The Churro Bites were one of my favorites. Crispy-doughy ridges covered with cinnamon and sugar, these are sure to please. Don’t forget the dipping sauce. It goes perfectly with the mini churros.

Where to find this line up? Go to https://charlesschwabfieldomaha.com/plan-your-visit/food-and-beverage

CWS Interview: Katie Cochran, Executive Chef – Levy Restaurants

OmahaNebraska.com’s Interview with Katie Cochran, Executive Chef for Levy Restaurants

Katie Cochran with background of scoreboards and stadium seating at Charles Schwab Field Park

OmahaNebraska.com here with…

Katie Cochran

That’s quite an amazing number and a variety of ideas you have.

Yeah.

I know your team starts on it [CWS menu offerings] right away because we’ve talked about it before, but what is a brainstorming session like?

It takes all of us. It’s great because we have seven chefs, so all of us kind of come up with little things. We look for trends. I think the tortellini was just kind of a toss in the hat. To be very honest, we started with tortilla chips and we’re like, “I don’t like that.” I didn’t like the marinara on the tortilla chips, and I sat there and I was like, “What if we fry cheese tortellinis?” and everyone was like, “Oh my God, let’s try it.” So we kind of feed off of each other too. We try out a lot of things and alter a lot of these recipes as we’re trying it. Everybody helps. It’s not just culinary too, because all of our front of the house and concessions people come to the tastings. They give us feedback, they let us know what they think, too. So we’re not just getting chefs’ opinions; we’re getting our whole team’s opinions.

In order, how much notice did you get on Omaha Steaks?

None, to be very honest. Ironically, I was at the ballpark and we were in the middle of a tasting with Adam. My Omaha Steaks rep was calling me, but I was in the middle of a conversation, so I did not pick up the phone. After that tasting was done, I talked with my director of operations and he asked me if I had talked with my rep, and I said, “Oh, I missed her call.” He then told me that she was let go on that day, and we received our last order the day prior. So we got zero notice, when we’d used them for… I’m pretty sure since the building was open.

So having to pivot suddenly and all of that, what was your thought process, and how did that work? Because this kind of thing happens to everybody in every kind of business.

Oh, 100%. I grew up in this industry, so the first thing I did was call my brother, who is a center-of-the-plate buyer for Cisco in the East Coast. And I was like, “What do I do? Who can I call?” And he kind of just walked some things through with me, and he kind of calmed me down a little bit. And then we just really started talking to US Foods, who our current rep is. I had a lot of brokers come and talk to me, which obviously are Smash Burgers, that’s how we got that in. Different brokers come and try to sell me their product. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t, right? But this was amazing, like they had that Smash Burger patty, and we had just lost Omaha Steaks, and it was just perfect timing at that point, and I was like “This is meant to be.” We were supposed to move on, I feel like, and we were supposed to find something new, and that can help us move forward, and I think that’s what we did.

There are new vendors that are going to be throughout all the other products, the hot dogs and everything else.

Yes, so before Omaha Steaks did hot dogs, we had Nathan’s. So we’re back to selling Nathan’s hot dogs.

Oh, that’s nice.

Yes, it’s a great hot dog. Personally, I feel like I like Nathan’s better than I liked the Omaha Steaks’. So we’re using that now, and we’re just finding different products.

What are one of your most favorite or couple of things this time around?

This time around… I love the Curve Ball. I was telling the other reporter that it was here last year. So that’s kind of the crazy thing: nobody knew about it. I didn’t want to put it out for media. I didn’t want to tell anybody unless I knew we could execute it as a team. And they did. They sold over 1,000 last year. Surprisingly, we really didn’t feel like we were going to sell that. But bringing that burger into the stands , it was a huge thing. There has never been a cheeseburger upstairs in the seats, so that was huge: bringing something that they’ve never been able to order in those seats. I think that’s why it sold really well last year. But it’s like a juicy lucy. It’s a beautiful patty in there. It’s got two pieces of American cheese, and it just oozes out. I think I had one every year last year. So I think that’s my favorite for this year, but that ties up with tortellini. They’re so good.

But as soon as you said that, was it cheese fried? Yeah, I was like, oh, that’s got to be amazing.

Oh God, it is. And with the marinara and the crispy pepperoni and the Italian sausage, it just really brings it all together.

Is there something you want to showcase or say?

Just make sure that everybody looks at the MECA website before they come out. They have all of the new items listed in all of their locations.

Are they listed now or soon?

I think that they’re going to be listed soon. Before tomorrow they’ll be listed. They have all of their stuff today and then they’re going to input all of that.

(https://charlesschwabfieldomaha.com)

Thank you.