How to Impress Your Friends with Insane Super Bowl Food Creations

The commercials. The halftime show. The office betting pool. The copious amounts of beer and pizza. These all are quintessential parts of the Super Bowl.

Oh—and there’s supposedly a football game, too. Cool.

Arguably the biggest sporting and TV event of the year, Super Bowl traditions render this American ritual an official holiday on the calendar. If you’re not hosting a watch party, chances are you’re attending one, and the food and drink will be as central to the event as a strong satellite signal. In fact, the USDA says we eat more food on Super Bowl Sunday than any other day of the year, excluding Thanksgiving. While there’s nothing wrong with making it easy by ordering a bunch of pizzas—after all, Americans ordered around the area of 12.5 million pizzas last Super Bowl—or bringing over chips and dip, you should aspire this year to make your Super Bowl food contributions the Instagram-worthy talk of the town.

The key to get everyone ooh-ing and ahh-ing and snapping pictures is to either create an amazing visual display or devise the most calorie-laden bomb in the world. That being said, it’s not just about making the world’s most loaded nacho tray or going super avant-garde with a mega sushi boat. Your contribution still needs to be football-themed, whether it’s dyeing everything team colors or fashioning foods into stadiums, helmets, or footballs.

Where to start, though? Unsurprisingly, the internet is chock full of photos of football-themed buffets, so much so that you could easily get overwhelmed by the sheer number of choices or get discouraged because you’re just not that artistic. Or have that much free time. Luckily for you, I’ve pulled together a curated sample of the best creations out there to get your imagination going, and provided some time-saving alternative recipes to inspire you to make this the Best. Super Bowl. Party. Ever. Just remember to take a picture before everyone digs in.

Inspiration #1: The Snack Stadium

Football Snack Stadium

Game Day Style

A mega snack stadium is like the Lombardi Trophy of football food creations, and there are a lot of them out there. This one’s a winner for the sheer height without the need for cardboard retaining walls. It’s especially functional as you can slowly dismantle the stadium wall’s french bread outer layer to eat the guacamole, black bean, and spinach dip inside. Extra points for the ingenious use of cheese for the stadium lights—isn’t the Super Bowl an evening game, after all? If you don’t have the time, money, or energy to build such a behemoth, create a stadium with walls and fans made of anything dippable—bread, baby carrots, whatever—and build it only one layer high. Now you’ve got your local suburban stadium, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Sandwich Stadium

Instagram

Prefer to make your stadium a meal instead of a snack? It’s hard to tell how tall this monster is, but it impressively has more than just chips and dip: Hoagie retaining wall, mini pizzas in the stands, pigs in a blanket, and more. Pity the poor guest who would show up with salsa and a bag of chips to this party.

Jello Shot Stadium

Kegworks

This may be easier to put together than a food snack stadium, but I hope whoever designed this one has a lot of people at their party or it could get dangerous. Then again, a host could get creative and put non-alcoholic Jell-O in there…or pudding…or cupcakes… hmm, the ideas are endless. Get the recipe.

Edible Football Stadium

A Cozy Kitchen

Does the thought of even attempting one of the above stadiums make you break out in a cold sweat? Then this football stadium is perfect for you, along with the rest of us who have jobs and lives and budgets. With easy assembly materials you can be assured that after your modest party of ten people leave, all of the food will be gone, too. Get the recipe.

Inspiration #2: The Giant Cheese Ball

Pepperoni Pizza Football Cheese Ball

Mom on Timeout

Nothing says “I hate my arteries” quite like a football-sized ball of cheese. And there are a lot of jumbo cheese balls out there. Cheese is so malleable, when put together the right way it’s easy to mold into a football shape. This one takes the delicious ridiculousness a step further and encrusts the entire thing in pepperoni. And that’s after the cheese is mixed with bacon. It’s like a triple-cheese pepperoni pizza without the crust. If you’ve got guests fighting over whether to get a pepperoni or cheese pizza, this will satisfy them both. The best news? It’s easy to make. Get the recipe.

Chocolate Chip Football Cheese Ball

Mom Endeavors

Have enough savory foods? Go for the dessert cheese ball. Instead of tangy cheese, this one is based in sweeter cream cheese. And since for some reason the cheese can’t be appreciated on its own, this one is also encrusted in a topping: chocolate chips. Nilla wafers serve as utensils. Get the recipe.

Inspiration #3: Anything Else Shaped Like a Football-Related Thing

Handheld Football Seven Layer Dip

Cupcake Project

Truthfully, anything football-shaped will win you at least a pat on the back from your guests for creativity. The recipe for this compact football-shaped dip says you should cut into it with a fork and knife, but go for gluttony gold and just chow down on it like a sandwich. Between the seven layers of crunchy cornmeal, the black beans, refried beans, and more, this will impress your guests and put them into a food coma all in one fell swoop. Their diet can re-start tomorrow. Get the recipe.

Chocolate-Covered Football Strawberries

Plain Chicken

If you’re going for a more elegant football theme than just plain gluttony, chocolate-dipped strawberries are a winner. It’s super convenient that the strawberries are already sort of football shaped, so all you need to do is dip and decorate. Get the recipe.

Football Stadium Cookies

Bake at 350

If you’re been making a lot of football-shaped things and are tired of staring at oblong foods, or just want an easier shape, these stadium cookies are for you. Use store-bought shortbread cookies or make your own. You could even go crazy and make a giant cookie with every yard line drawn out. Sprinkles, icing, and square corners: It’s a recipe for success. Get the recipe.

Salted Beer Soft Pretzel Footballs

Hungry Happenings

Beer? Pretzels? Beer pretzels? Winner. Amazingly, these nifty looking football-shaped pretzels are only made with four ingredients, and you don’t even have to make the dough from scratch. They’ll take you a bit of time, but it’s a fun hand-held themed food that will impress your guests. Get the recipe.

Watermelon Football Helmet

Watermelon.org

Okay, fine, I’ll put something healthy in here, though it’s an anathema to Super Bowl traditions. Fill with whatever fruit you like. You’ll need strong carving skills, but the result will be centerpiece worthy. Luckily this recipe has a how-to video to help you along. And hey, at least it’s not shaped like a football. Get the recipe.

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Will Virtual and Augmented Reality Change the Food Industry?

Daydream Labs

You’re probably sick of hearing about how virtual and augmented reality will be the next big thing. Headlines declaring its revolutionary ascent have seemed excessive and hyperbolic, but you’ve got to admit this new technology has a lot of potential to shift how we’re able to perceive the world. (Even if it’s yet to have a mainstream moment beyond Father John Misty rhyming “Oculus Rift” with “Taylor Swift.”)

One unexpected area that AR and VR could have a major impact is in the food industry. And believe it or not, your kitchen may already contain some creepily fascinating augmented and/or virtual experiences.

Play with your food

Marketers are already tapping into your ability to interact with basic household foods in a more playful, even game-ified way. Take cereal, for instanc. Nestlé managed to print an AR game on 26 million cereal boxes, featuring characters from the children’s movie “Rio.” By utilizing a webcam, players can try to feed a cartoon bird by tipping their hand to fill a bowl. Sounds like a recipe for spilling to me!

Walmart and Kraft have also joined forces to create scannable labels featuring tips, recipes, and contest entry forms to meet country singer Brad Paisley. (I guess he really likes cheese singles? )

And in a far creepier twist, the Treasury Wine Estates has a line of 19 wines, each of which feature a criminal on the label. Their latest app allows you to bring those convicts to life. Because sure, who doesn’t want to be taunted by a notorious murderer while under the influence?

These may all seem like short-term marketing gimmicks—and they definitely are—but at the consumer level, it’s the most direct way for customers to engage with products, in hopes of increasing brand loyalty. However there are most significant implications for AR and VR in the culinary world, beyond  interacting with the ghost of criminals while sipping merlot.

Actually learn a culinary skill

VR could be an incredibly easy way to streamline employee training in the food industry. From learning how to operate fancy coffee machines to mastering the art of noodles, virtual reality can actually teach you real-world skills. Software engineers at Daydream Labs are already helping people perfect their espresso pull and tech company Klip Collective has helped train employees at Philadelphia’s Honeygrow restaurant chain using some fascinating devices.

By recreating all sorts of scenarios and locations, often from under the hood of a helmet, chefs and amateurs alike gain access to a variety of situations they might encounter and can adapt accordingly. They can also practice these skills in a low pressure, digital environment, gaining confidence on their way to preparing an actual meal.

Home cooks can also get in on the action. Augmented reality is shockingly effective at showing what food should look like in ways that go beyond photograph. For example, if you’re baking a cake, how tall should it be? And what should the layers actually look like from a scaled perspective? This is where Romain Rouffet comes in. He’s a self-professed “3D scanning enthusiast” who has captured every layer of a banoffee (banana and toffee) pie in three dimensions.

Banoffee recipe
by R0m1R
on Sketchfab

Viewers can click and drag their mouse around to view the delicious dessert from every angle, ensuring their versions come out just as evenly. The same technology can also be used to help estimate more realistic and healthy portion sizes. Here’s hoping it’s only a matter of time before all recipes are accompanied by such augmented, in-depth models.

When can we taste VR food?

While we can’t eat virtual food just yet, Patrón will still give you a tour of their hacienda. You can explore their estate and the Tequila-making process with their new app. Con: no buzz. Pro: no hangover!

Also the world’s most expensive restaurant does offer VR broccoli for a mere $2,000. I’m not sure what stage of late capitalism blowing two grand on fake vegetables qualifies as, but I’m sure it’s being worked into the next season of “Black Mirror” as I type this.

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Easy Mexican Chicken and Rice Soup

This is my mother-in-law’s chicken soup. She is of Mexican descent and her soup is held in high esteem in our household.

As soon as the cold weather arrives, this soup goes into the weekly rotation. We never get tired of having it on the menu!

Continue reading "Easy Mexican Chicken and Rice Soup" »

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