Super Bowl 2009 - The Food Play-By-Play

Last night's Super Bowl XLIII was bitter-sweet in outcome but not in the food. As custom goes, we went my brother and sister in-law, Josh and Diana's place where they hosted their annual Superbowl shin-dig. Everyone had a great time, and Josh and Di stepped it up in the grub department--even more so than usual. Here are some of the culinary touchdowns of the night:

Coconut Shrimp - Courtesy of Carla who works at a Long Island steakhouse, these were no joke. They were super sweet and coconut-ey, exemplifying a dessert element rather than an appetizer. The shrimp itself was delicious, fresh and jumbo sized--perfect for a Super Bowl treat.

Pigs in a Blanket - This is Diana's specialty, which she excels at. The special touch lies in the crescent dough that Diana individually wraps each "pig" in. You could tell that these aren't your standard out of the box frozen hot dogs. A lot of love, care and attention goes into them and it shows.

The Wings - Much to everyone's surprise, Blondie's wings actually made an appearance this year. After last year's disappointment, when they went missing en-route, we were able to feast on two varieties at this Super Bowl--medium and my personal favorite, honey mustard (aka "dessert wings"). They were as tasty as always and Diana made sure to supplement them with plenty of carrots, celery and blue cheese. They made our Super Bowl experience more complete.

Chocolate Cupcakes - Audra is famous for baking her Super Bowl themed cupcakes. This year she showed support of the Pittsburgh Steelers by inter-weaving their team colors into the frosting. While the cupcakes were all chocolate, I loved that they included different flavors of frosting such as lemon, cream cheese and chocolate. I went for the lemon and it proved to be refreshing and a nice complement to the moist chocolate batter.

Mac n' Cheese - I like to think that my presence at the annual Super Bowl party is wanted because of my personality, but the reality is that people just want my mac n' cheese. Every year, I make this dish and every year people flock to it. I have a couple of loyal fans that greet me with "hey...so...d'ya make the mac n' cheese?" Needless to say, this is no ordinary, elbow macaroni and American cheese combo. Instead it incorporates four different cheeses and even a bechamel sauce to bind it all together. You can use the recipe here, and change some things around to make it your own. To step it up this year, I added bits of crispy pancetta right into the bechamel sauce.

Hope that your Super Bowl was as gratifying--for your mind and your tummy--as mine!