WINGS FOR WISHES took place on Saturday, March 9, 2019 behind Sports Grill South Miami. The 5th Annual Wings For Wishes raised $250,000 to help sponsor wishes through Make-A-Wish® Southern Florida. Wings For Wishes, presented by AirSouth Mechanical, and co-hosted by Make-A-Wish Champions Gal Bensaadon and Brian Exelbert and Sports Grill South Miami, is a family-friendly event centered on Sports Grill’s famous Special Grilled chicken wings and raising money to sponsor wishes. This year’s event drew more than 1,800 attendees and included 90 corporate sponsors.
Back by popular demand, was the friendly chicken-wing eating competition between local news stations WSVN-TV, WPLG Local10, NBC 6 Miami, and CBS 4 Miami. Afterward, more than 66 teams of hungry competitors battled for the fastest time to eat 50 wings in the Official Wing Eating Competition.
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- Winning team celebrates
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- Sports Grill’s Christine Marques with Winning Teams announcement board
The event also featured the new Signature Wing Tasting that offered unique chicken wing recipes from Sports Grill, Chifa, House of Mac, TOWN Kitchen & Bar, Tap 42, Miccosukee Restaurant, and McCormick’s. Lokal was also on hand to serve their famous chili. In all, over 14,500 wings were consumed.
Wings For Wishes was developed in 2014 when local professionals Gal Bensaadon and Brian Exelbert were eating wings during their usual Friday lunch. Their goal was to create a unique fundraising concept accessible to a broad audience.
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- Alonso from House of MAC putting out the wings
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- Eric from Chifa serving it up
“It’s incredible to think on what we’ve accomplished in just five years,” said Gal Bensaadon. “With this year’s success and the tremendous support from our sponsors, families, and friends we’ve raised enough money to grant 116 wishes. The families that we celebrate are the true heroes in this story. What they experience on a daily basis is difficult to fathom. If we can hit the pause button on that and bring joy into their lives, then we’ve achieved something pretty awesome.”
“What started as a simple idea to do something fun and different to raise money for a charity, has developed into granting hundreds of wishes and touching thousands of lives,” said Brian Exelbert. “We created a special moment in time when companies, executives, politicians, community leaders, and passionate volunteers come together for one common goal, to create
and grant wishes.”
Learn more at .
Whiskey Allstars performing on stage
Wish granted to young Miles Vedrano, son of long-time event volunteer Nate Vedrano, with mom looking on.
Chef Trevor ‘s TKB wings with Al Pastor sauce and topped with Cotija cheese and cilantro
