Chef Marina StaverA dinner that matters — a milestone birthday, a closing celebration, the first evening in a new home — deserves more than trays delivered to the door. You want to sit at your own table, with your guests, while someone who has done this for two decades runs the kitchen. In short: I am Marina Staver, a European-trained private chef with more than two decades of private kitchen experience across Europe and now South Florida. I am the chef at every event — cooking from scratch in your home, sourced that morning — across Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach. Dinners from $200 per guest plus groceries, $2,000 minimum per event. |
From family kitchens in Europe to tables in Miami
I am from Minsk, Belarus. I trained as a cook and worked in restaurant kitchens before I moved into private homes.
In a family kitchen the brief was never a menu — it was a household. Allergies, grandparents, children who eat at their own pace, a host who wants the evening to feel effortless. Over more than two decades of private kitchen experience for families across Europe, that became my craft: reading a table, not just feeding it.
In 2021 I moved to South Florida and started The Staver — the same practice, now in Miami: one chef, one home, one evening at a time. I work as a private chef across the region.
I also write about food. I run a column in Belavia OnAir magazine, and when I travel I learn recipes from local people, taste national dishes, and ask to be let into the kitchen — to watch the process, talk with the chefs, and cook a traditional dish together — those tastes find their way back to my tables in Miami. Twenty-five of those columns are collected here: my published writing.
How I work
I hand-select every ingredient the morning of your dinner. The menu is built around your guests and confirmed with you before I shop.
Everything is prepared in your kitchen — raw ingredients to warm plates. No pre-made components, no reheating, no trays.
The Staver is not a marketplace of interchangeable chefs. I am the chef at your dinner — present, named, accountable.
You stay in the conversation. The kitchen returns to order before I say goodnight.
A Michelin star dinner at home.Caitlyn Hayek · Google review
What I cook
Where I cook
A curated set of 49 zip codes across Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach: from Brickell high-rises and Miami Beach rentals to Coral Gables, Fort Lauderdale, Boca Raton, and Palm Beach island.
$2,000 minimum per event. Groceries are billed separately and itemized in your quote. See what a private chef costs in Miami.
One evening. Your table.
Send the date, the number of guests, and anything your guests cannot or will not eat. I reply with availability and a menu direction within 24 hours.
Book my date