Some dishes don’t just taste good. They take you somewhere.
That is the idea at the heart of Chef Irving Cupul’s cuisine at Ramona, the signature restaurant at NIZUC Resort & Spa. Here, a bite can carry you back to a place, a time, a feeling you thought you had forgotten. Chef Cupul calls it cocina de recuerdos, the cuisine of memories.
In 2026, Food & Wine en Español named Irving Cupul one of its “Best New Chefs”, celebrating a new generation of cooks who are shaping the future of Mexican gastronomy.
For Chef Cupul, though, the future isn’t a departure from the past. It grows out of it. His cuisine is rooted in his heritage, yet always looking forward, and at Ramona, tradition and innovation sit at the same table.
His story begins in Cancún, but it reaches much further. His mother is Oaxacan, with Mixtec heritage. His father is Yucatecan, with Mayan roots. Growing up between these two worlds, Irving absorbed flavors, traditions, and ways of seeing food that would later become the foundation of everything he cooks.
Today, that inheritance is on every plate. He begins with traditional techniques and regional ingredients, then reimagines Mexican recipes through a contemporary eye, honoring where they come from while daring to ask where they can go.
Over the years, working across the hospitality and restaurant worlds, Chef Cupul built a style that is unmistakably his: inventive, deeply informed about product, and above all respectful of what each ingredient truly is.
Cupul’s philosophy fits in a single line: “Every ingredient has its place, every technique its purpose, and every flavor a reason to be there.”
Nothing on his plates is there by accident. Every element must earn its place and add to the flavor, the memory, and the identity of the dish.
At Ramona, that philosophy becomes an experience. The menu draws on flavors guests already know and love, local products, traditional recipes, and echoes of regions across Mexico. The goal is not only to impress, but to move: to create an emotional connection between the diner and what’s on the plate.
The country has taken notice. Ramona received the 2024 César Balsa Award for Best Hotel Restaurant from CANIRAC, and the 2024 Quintana Roo Gastronomic Recognition from the state legislature. It also appears in the Guía México Gastronómico: Top 250 Restaurants for 2025 and 2026, from Culinaria Mexicana, S. Pellegrino, and Nespresso.
