Super Bowl LV

Hello 2021. As we are realizing much hasn’t changed since we said good-bye to 2020 just a couple of months ago. Do we even remember where we were celebrating last year’s Super Bowl? I’m sure I was hosting a Super Bowl party at my house. I usually do a Super Bowl party at home, because, let’s face it; it’s on a Sunday night and it starts at 6:30 pm and my pjs are very close by once the champagne starts flowing in the locker rooms.

This year was not much different, except; it wasn’t much of a party (just a couple of close “bubble friends”) and it wasn’t inside my house. It was inside my new 2020 quarantine cave, aka: my made-over garage. 2020 was a year of stay at home and stay safe. Yes, I had many lost friends who continued to party like it was 1999, but I was one of the very few who felt the real effects of Covid 19. But I got tired of staying inside my house all of the time. So my boyfriend and I constructed a get-away just feet from the living room. A real sports bar with a very cool sofa, a wall with wine glasses, ambient lights, a full-size refrigerator and best of all no lines to the clean bathroom.

We watched all of our favorite sports out there in 2020. If the weather was nice, we’d open the door and let the breeze in, but mostly we enjoyed the secluded, safe feeling of being in a private watching room.

Super Bowl LV was made for us, or better yet, I was ready to make Super Bowl LV into a real party.

What does someone make for a Super Bowl garage turned sports bar fiesta? Well, you make what is expected. And if there are only 4 people? Who cares? You cook like both teams are going to stop over once they finish playing. Here is the menu: two different slabs of ribs in the slow cooker, dozen of chicken wings cooked to perfection in the air-fryer, 7 layer bean dip with chips, prosciutto rolled mozzarella and for dessert, chocolate chip cookies and fudge brownies. Here’s the catch. I have a very limited diet. Honestly, I can only eat certain foods, before I get pretty sick; therefore, I have to plan a menu very carefully before I cook. I am gluten and dairy free. Ahhh, the challenges are set.

Let’s start with the ribs. Yay, meat is possible! We rub those suckers with lots of seasonings. Luckily, most seasonings are safe. We use garlic salt, pepper, paprika, bone sucking seasoning on one slab and throw it in the slow cooker in the “cave” and set it for 8 hours. The other slab we rub with garlic salt and pepper but this time I found a Korean BBQ sauce that was gluten and dairy free so I doused the ribs and threw those into my convection oven in a slower cooker pot. My dog just about went crazy all day smelling those ribs just cooking away. 8 hours later, both were literally falling off the bones. The ones without any sauce we then set out with different kinds of gluten free BBQ sauces to dip, dip, dip.

The chicken drumsticks and wings are super easy in my air-fryer. Again, just season them with yummy seasonings. No oil needed, although I do spray the air-fryer base. I have a 5 quart air-fryer that has metal racks that I can place in it to add more cooking room. This way we can cook 2 dozen wings at one time. We cooked those suckers up early, so not to be stressed before the game. Once they were finished, we put them in bags with gluten-free BBQ sauce and shook them to cover them completely. Yummm! We refrigerated them in glass, re-heatable dishes that could be thrown into the microwave just before game time, just to take the chill off.

OK, I did cheat with the seven layer bean dip. I found one at my local Costco’s that was actually gluten-free. I decided that instead of gathering all the ingredients to put together the layers, I’d let the professionals take care of that for me. It was not dairy free, but if I take something before hand I can indulge. I did buy some gluten-free chips to go along with the dip, so that was workable.

The prosciutto rolls are super easy. Just take a mozzarella stick and wrap a piece of prosciutto around each one. Again, I could have gone dairy free on the cheese, and there are many great dairy free cheeses out there, but I opted for regular mozzarella on these and chose to take something before hand.

As far as the desserts go, I knew I wouldn’t be eating them, so again I went for pre-made. I have made gluten-free chocolate chip cookies and brownies before and honestly, you would not know the difference. I chose to easy way out for the game, and as I thought, they were untouched.

This was a fun, safe and yummy Super Bowl. I have a feeling that next year the menu and location may be very similar. Why change a good thing? I am definitely looking forward to the Final Four. I may start planning the menu now.