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For me, watching the Superbowl is a time-honored ritual that I've enjoyed since watching my first, and the first Superbowl contest, way back in 1966, with my dad, who was an avid football fan, in particular, a San Francisco 49'ers fan. In the nearly 50 years since that distant day when I watched my first Superbowl, I've only missed a handful of games, all due to active military duty or having to work during the game, and not being able to get out of it. In recent years, now that I have a bit more clout and seniority in the company, I can usually trade shifts with a non-football fan, (yeah, some of those specimens actually do exist...) take a personal day off, or just call in sick. For Superbowl Sunday, there are three things on my agenda: 1) Watch the game 2) Pig out on Superbowl food 3) Drink beer! So to complete objective number 2, special food for Superbowl XLIII was in order.
Photo: Fragrant mesquite smoke is coming from my Weber Genesis grill, and that means I'm ready to begin cooking. Note the empty pan on the stool in front of the grill, as the chicken has been placed inside the grill to sear. Normally, my wife and I attempt to eat very healthy, nutritional, well-balanced meals, not only to keep unwanted pounds off our bodies, but to keep our doctor happy. Yes, that means religiously adhering to the food pyramid, shunning alcohol, and avoiding deep-fried food like the plague. But for one day, February 1, 2009, all bets were thrown out the window, as how can you enjoy Superbowl without lots of beer, and more importantly, deep-fried food? We can't, and we won't... so step aside healthy food, and hello to the wonders of deep-fried goodness! At hour house, Superbowl XLIII was to be a very low-key affair, as there were only the four of us, plus our four cats, but they don't count, even though they'd love to be included... I stepped up to the plate and volunteered to do most of the planning, preparation work, and the actual cooking. Sharlene agreed to play a mostly supporting role, as she had things she had to do that weekend, and she's not a football fan, and not really interested in the game, just the commercials, the half time show, and the food that I was planning to make. Casey and Tim aren't football fans either, but the food piqued their interest, so they decided to stick around for the festivities, and to spend a time in deep-fried heaven. Planning for the event started late last year, when I told my boss I wouldn't be available to work the first weekend in February; I asked him not to bother scheduling me, as I wouldn't be showing up, no matter what... Planning for the Superbowl menu started a couple of weeks before the game, and by the weekend before the game, we'd settled on what we were going to serve. Here's the menu we decided upon for Superbowl XLIII: *
Grilled chicken drumsticks, Superbowl style Click on the hyperlink for our recipes, published on this web site. Sounds pretty simple and basic, right? Not a lot of preparation? It wasn't quite that easy... The Wednesday before the game, I checked out what we had on hand, looking in the pantry and the refrigerator, so I could make a list of things that I needed to purchase at the grocery store. Most of the stuff we had on hand, but we needed a few items such as potsticker wrappers, green onions, avocados, shredded Mexican cheese, whipped butter, tomatillos, sour cream and chicken. So before going to work on Wednesday, I stopped at our local supermarket and purchased some of the harder to find items, like the potsticker wrappers, as I preferred to purchase the easy-to-find items at one of the discount supermarket chains that stays open all night; now you know what I did when I got off work on Friday night at midnight!
Photo: Tomatillos, diced onions, garilic and jalapeņo peppers cook in my wok basket. That's spaghetti squash, cooking on the elevated heat at the back of the grill, over indirect heat. Superbowl tradition calls for chicken wings, deep-fried, and morphed into Buffalo Wings, which is a dish that I rarely will pass by. But prices for chicken wings aren't what they used to be, as wings were prices at $2.99 a pound, vs. $.99 for drumsticks, so I opted for drumsticks. I didn't want to go away hungry, so I purchased a 4-1/2 pound package of drumsticks, to ensure plenty of left-overs for the upcoming work week. Saturday morning, I did a once-over of all the items that we were going to use on Super Sunday, and all items were present and accounted for. To implant a smoky flavor into the chicken, potatoes and quesadillas that I was to prepare on the outdoor grill, I grabbed a couple of handfuls of mesquite wood chips to soak in water overnight. By soaking the chips in water, they produce more smoke; more smoke equal more smoky flavor. The day promised to be busy, as I had lots of other projects on my to-do list, so Super Bowl food preparation would have to wait until later in the day. The food preparation fun started Saturday night, after dinner, as I decided to tackle the most laborious project, making the potstickers. Making potstickers is laborious and tedious, as everything has to be measured, and all ingredients must be cut into very small pieces, and it's all done by hand. When everything is mixed together, you have to place a spoonful of filling on each potsticker wrapper, fold it over, and pinch it around the edges to close and seal it, and well... make it a potsticker. By the time I was finished with cutting up all the ingredients, mixing them together, and placing spoonfuls of the filling onto the 48 potsticker wrappers, about 2 hours had gone by. Then, I had to pre-cut tomatillos, dice onions, jalapeņo pepper and garlic for tomorrow's salsa verde, apply rub to the chicken drumsticks and seal them in a plastic bag to marinate overnight, dice the peppers and onions for the stuffed potatoes, and slice onions for the onion rings... I put everything in freezer bags, and stuck them in the refrigerator, to use the next day. It was about 10 O'clock by the time I was finished, and I was tired, and ready for bed. Sunday morning, February 1, 2009, found me up and at 'em by 7:00 O'clock, as I wanted to take a long walk before the game, so I wouldn't have to worry as much about how many calories that I was consuming. By the time I dragged myself back to the house around 11:00 AM, I'd clocked 11.30 miles, which is about twice the number of miles that I usually walk on my days off from work. So now it was time to fire up the grill, and get the potatoes and squash cooking.
Photo: My quesadillas are almost ready to take off the grill; note the grill marks. Thin foods, such as quesadillas, are almost always cooked over direct heat. The squash is still cooking on the elevated rack at the rear of the grill. Whoa! I didn't mention that I'd purchased a big spaghetti squash, on the way home from my walk. I usually make most of my dinner entrees for the coming work week in advance, as its easier, and it saves time in the long run. I reasoned that since I had the grill fired up, I might as well cook squash, as I had the capacity, and the fuel costs would be the same, not to mention that the grill would implant a delicious, smoky taste to the squash. Not to mention that I enjoy cooking outdoors, so as time permits, I cook as much as possible outside. The grill and smoker are located under the gazebo that protects the hot tub, so we can cook outside in any weather, any time of the day or night. While the grill was heating, I prepared the potatoes and the squash. I cut the squash in half, and scooped out the non-edible insides, careful to save the seeds, as I like to bake the seeds and add them to my salad; baked squash seeds add a "earthy" taste to the salad. I also attempt to utilize as much of the squash as possible, as I paid $.99 per pound for the thing, and I wanted to get my money's worth out of it. When the grill temperature reached 350 degrees, I placed the squash and the potatoes inside of it, on racks well above direct heat, so to bake the squash and potatoes for one hour, as you would do in an indoor oven. I use a Webber Genesis gas grill that I've owned for the past 13 years, and I use it for baking almost as much as grilling, as it's that versatile. Don't get me wrong, I love a charcoal-fired grill, but the convenience of gas just can't be beat. While the squash and potatoes were baking, I went inside the house and prepared the quesadillas. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to pre-cut the ingredients for the quesadillas the night before, as the quesadilla ingredients must be diced just before grilling, so they don't get mushy; nothing is worse than mushy toppings on a quesadilla. Quesadillas are best cooked by grilling directly over high heat, until one side receives grill marks, which takes about 3 or 4 minutes, depending on how hot the fire is. Then, the quesadillas are flipped over, and the other side is cooked for about 2 minutes, or until distinct grill marks appear, at which time you're finished. I remarked to Sharlene that the quesadillas smelled like they'd been cooked at a small, roadside stand in Mexico, as smoke from the mesquite chips, the olive oil from the potatoes and the squash, and the earthy smell of the corn tortillas, transported my senses to Mexico. I removed the quesadillas from the grill, brought them inside to rest, and greased the grill again, as it was now time to sear the chicken. I arranged the chicken on the grill, "just so," in order for the drumsticks to sear. The idea of searing is twofold: 1) Searing seals the meat and locks in the juices... 2) It implants attractive grill marks. I seared the chicken drumsticks on one side for about 5 minutes, until grill marks began to appear, then flipped them over, carefully rearranging them on the grill, and seared the other side for about another 4 minutes. I picked up one of the legs with my handy tongs, noticed that both sides had grill marks, which meant they were ready to remove from direct heat, so I removed them from the grill, and brought them inside the house, and placed the drumsticks inside one of our ovens, so the cats wouldn't attempt to make a meal of the seared chicken legs. By now, the potatoes and the squash had been baking over indirect heat for a little over an hour at 350 degrees, and I knew they were ready, so I removed them from the grill, brought them inside the house, and set them aside to cool down. Since the grill was sizzling hot, it was time to cook the ingredients for the salsa verde, so I placed a wok basket filled with the sliced tomatillos, onions, peppers and garlic on the grill, to cook for the salsa verde. Using my best stir fry technique, I allowed the tomatillos to cook on one side until they were slightly charred, then I added a touch of olive oil, and stirred the contents of the wok until everything was well blended. I closed the lid of the grill, and waited a couple of minutes for the tomatillos to cook, opened the grill, and removed the wok basket from the grill and brought it inside to cool and rest a bit before throwing the contents into the blender. Total cooking time on the grill for the tomatillos and the other ingredients for the salsa verde was about 6 minutes, at a very hot 400 degrees, over direct heat.
Photo: I open the lid of the grill to display my chicken, and stuffed potatoes that are baking, oven style. If it sounds like timing is everything, than you're right, as all of these activities had to be carefully orchestrated to utilize time efficiently, as time is money when Superbowl kickoff time approaches. By now, it was about 01:30 in the afternoon, about two hours until kickoff. I had things pretty much under control, but there were so many other things that needed to be done... In the meantime, I added a few more mesquite chips to the fire, in order to produce a fresh round of savory smoke, as it was time to put the chicken back on the grill. Our Weber Genesis grill has three burners, so I turned the front two burners off, and I turned the back burner to high heat. The idea is to cook the chicken over indirect heat, which is in effect baking the chicken. The drumsticks were already seared, to lock in the flavorful juices, but the inside of the chicken was raw, hence the idea of baking it. Only somebody who doesn't have a clue of what they're doing cooks chicken completely over high heat, as if you attempt to cook chicken that way, all you'll be rewarded with is burnt, crispy chicken, which is not my idea of grilled chicken. I tore off a couple of pieces of aluminum foil, each about the length of the grill, and placed half the drumsticks on one piece of foil, and the remainder of the drumsticks on the other piece. Then I poured barbecue sauce over each piece of chicken, (in this case, I used hickory flavored barbecue sauce, as that's what I had on hand) and using a basting brush, I smeared the barbecue sauce uniformly over each drumstick, to make sure that each drumstick was well-coated with sauce. I brought the chicken outside and placed it on the grill, at the front of the grate, over the unlit burners, to allow it to bake for an hour at 350 degrees. That is the essence of cooking over indirect heat, which is the method used for large cuts of meat, and meat that has already been seared. Oh yes, the onion rings! I took the slices of red onions that I had prepared the night before and placed them into a shallow baking dish, and covered them with buttermilk, and placed the dish back in the refrigerator. The idea is to allow the buttermilk to soak into the onions, and for the onion slices to be as cold as possible. The batter sticks better, and ultimately, you'll enjoy better onion rings. By now the baked potatoes had cooled, so I dug the pulp out of them, mixed in the package of diced onions, peppers and garlic that I'd prepared the night before, and added a small amount of sour cream to hold the mixture together. Using a large spoon, I mashed up the pulp and blended everything together, added a teaspoon of ground cumin and oregano, then I spooned in equal amounts of the potato pulp mixture into the potato skins. Next, I drizzled about a teaspoon of melted butter over each stuffed potato, and topped them with a teaspoon or so of shredded, Mexican cheese. I brought the stuffed potatoes outside, and placed them inside the grill, on one of the racks above the grate, to allow them to bake to completion, over indirect heat, above the cooking chicken. Looking at my watch, I figured the potatoes should be ready about 02:30 PM, and the chicken about 3:00 PM, close to kickoff, but still OK. By now the time was approaching 2:00 PM, and I still had a million things to do before I could relax and watch the game. Of course the Superbowl pre-game show had been in full-swing for several hours... The squash was cool, so I scooped out the pulp from the shell, and placed it in a plastic container, to be eaten for dinner during the upcoming week. To me, any variety of squash is a delicious, and one of my favorite side-dishes to accompany just about any meal, but baked squash has no part in a Superbowl dinner! Back inside the kitchen, I figured it was time to fire up the deep fryer, as it takes a few minutes to bring it up to operating temperature. In the meantime, the quesadillas were cool enough to work with, so I took a sharp knife and cut them into quarters, which takes a bit of a technique so you don't squash the contents. Next, I took the ingredients for the salsa verde, dumped them in a blender, added cumin, salt, a few drops of liquid smoke, four tablespoons of chicken broth, and give them a whirl for a minute of two. Out of the blender emerged perfect salsa verde, identical to the variety that you'll find on the streets of Tijuana or Mexicali. Salsa verde makes a wonderful dip for tortilla or corn chips, and it's good on practically any cooked vegetable. I planned to use leftover salsa verde as a topping for my squash during the upcoming work week. Looking outside, I noticed a cloud of smoke coming from the grill, and my nose alerted me to the delicious odor of mesquite-flavored chicken, cooking over the grill. Being the curious sort, I just had to go outside, lift the grill cover, and take a peak, and a whiff. As I mentioned before, I'm a firm believer in searing the chicken over direct, high heat, and then cooking it over indirect heat until the inside is done, and just barely pink. Barbecue sauce is NEVER to be used over direct, high heat, as the sauce contains sugar, and it will char and burn. When the chicken is seared, I remove it from direct heat, place it in aluminum foil, and then coat it with barbecue sauce, to be cooked over indirect heat. Although I'm using a grill, I'm actually baking the chicken. You could accomplish this last step in an indoor oven, but by baking it on the outdoor grill, you implant a smoky, outdoor taste into the chicken, that just can't be duplicated inside. Not to mention, it's a whole lot more fun to cook outside!
Photo: Chicken drumsticks are coated in barbecue sauce, and are baking over indirect heat, in the foreground of the photo, as the stuffed potatoes bake on the elevated rack towards the rear of the grill. By now, I knew that I didn't have time to make salsa cruda or guacamole, so I asked Sharlene to make the guacamole, and instead of making salsa cruda from scratch, she just poured a jar of commercial Southwest style salsa into a dish, for chip dipping. If you know which brand to use, you can enjoy some delicious, commercially-prepared salsa; just make sure you get the thick variety, and check to make sure it contains kernels of corn. Time to pop the top on another beer... Two thirty, less than an hour until kickoff, and it was time to remove the stuffed potatoes from the grill, as they were done to perfection. As long as I had the grill open, I added some more barbecue sauce to the chicken, which was cooking perfectly. I was enjoying the 70's rock band, Journey, as they performed for the pre-game show on the television, and the beer was delicious and cold. The deep fryer was very hot by now, so it was time to fry the potstickers, which I anticipated to be a snap, as they were already pre-made from the night before; all I had to do was remove them from the refrigerator, place a few at a time in the deep fryer, allow them to fry for a 45 seconds or so, take them out, place them on a plate, and add a fresh batch into the deep fryer. Well, you know the story about the best laid plans of mice and men... Murphy was my companion today, as the potstickers were stuck together! Every mother's son... and there was no way that they could be separated, as they had fused together while sitting in the refrigerator overnight. I was disappointed and mad, to say the least, as I'd spent damn near three hours the night before making these things, not only to taste good, but to be pretty, and now the whole thing resembled a mass of clay. What do you do to save the day? Simply reach in, make little balls of potsticker dough and filling, and deep fry them, "as is." They don't look pretty like potstickers should look like, but they taste the same. So by the time the National Anthem was being sung, by beautiful Jennifer Hudson, I had a plate of deep fried, potsticker wannabees set on the table, ready to enjoy. Before kickoff, there appeared to be enough time to remove the chicken from the grill, before kickoff, so I rushed outside, turned off the gas to the grill, removed the chicken from the grill, and rushed back inside the kitchen, where I could see the game. Our house has three levels; the kitchen is on the middle level and looks down into the family room, where our hi-def television is located, so you can watch the TV while you're working at the island, in the center of the kitchen. You can hear the game as well, as we have a surround sound system, complete with a pounding sub woofer that really gives you an earful of the action. So I wasn't really missing the game by working in the kitchen, but it wasn't as up-close-and-personal that my viewing habits prefer. Sharlene, Casey and Tim had offered to help with food preparation, multiple times, but I sort of have a method and a rhythm, and by including somebody else, I'd probably get out of synch, and I'd spend as much time explaining what I wanted accomplished as if I had done the deed by myself. As mentioned previously, I had Sharlene prepare the salsa and the guacamole.
Photo: Our Superbowl XLIII feast, from left to right: Red, southwestern style salsa, guacamole, stuffed potatoes, potstickers, quesadillas, grilled chicken,, tortilla chips, and a plate of deep fried onion rings, in the center. One last thing to make before our Superbowl feast could begin: Onion rings, which is a simple endeavor. I measured two cups of Bisquick and placed it in a large mixing bowl. Next, I removed the dish of onions that had been marinating in buttermilk in the refrigerator, and placed the dish on the island, next to the Bisquick and the deep fryer. To cook the onion rings, you simply remove an onion ring, that has been soaking in buttermilk, dredge it in the Bisquick, making sure its coated evenly, and gently lower it into the deep fryer. In cooking onion rings, I'm constantly placing Bisquick-coated onion rings in the deep fryer, and while they're cooking, I'm constantly removing cooked onion rings and placing them on a plate. Each onion ring takes only about 45 seconds to fry, so it's a constant in 'n out thing, and an ongoing evolution... you'll get into a rhythm that will allow you to whistle Dixie while you work, as you reach over and grab a swig of a cold one while you work. The first quarter was well underway by the time I finished deep frying the onion rings, and Pittsburgh was leading by a field goal, 3 to 0. I went outside to check to see if the grill was cool enough to cover and put away; it was, so I closed the grill lid, covered the grill with a tarp, and then secured the tarp over the grill, and the adjacent smoker to keep the rain away. Back inside the house, I glanced at the game, and dashed upstairs to take a shower, in order to remove the grill and wood smoke smell that I'd accumulated during the last four hours or so of cooking. By the beginning of the second quarter, all the food was ready, the table was set, and the score was 10 to 0, in favor of Pittsburgh, and I was showered, shaved, relaxed, and ready to enjoy the game, drink some more beer, and a enjoy delicious Superbowl feast. As we all know, the Pittsburgh Steelers emerged victorious over the Arizona Cardinals, 27 to 23, in one of the better Superbowl games that I can recall. We were rooting for the Cardinals, due to the fact that they've never played in a Superbowl game, much less won a Superbowl, but it wasn't to be, as the Steelers pretty much had the game bottled up by the end of the second quarter, when James Harrison made his 100 yard interception return. But it was a good game, and a worthy effort on the part of both teams. We ate only a fraction of the food that I'd prepared, as I made enough food for a small army. However, that's not a problem, as leftovers provided me for much of my food during the following work week, as I don't have a problem eating left overs. It is said that deep fried food can't be re-headed successfully, but I enjoyed deep-fried potstickers and onion rings for the next week.
Photo: Here's one of several meals that I took to work made from leftovers from our Superbowl feast. Left to right: Onion ring, two potstickers, half of a baked potato, grilled chicken, removed from bone, one quarter quesadilla, spaghetti squash, topped with salsa verde. I have to eat very modestly in order to keep my weight in check. My co-workers raved about my meals... Looking back on this year's Superbowl feast, outside of the "stuck" potstickers, everything went together well, everybody loved the food, and everything went pretty much according to plan. Next year, if we have another Superbowl feast, I think I'll make it more of a community event, and give each participant a specific dish to prepare, and a task to do, and I'll just concentrate either on the grill, or the deep fryer. Not counting the time spent at the grocery store, between the preparation and cooking of our Superbowl feast, I spent a total of about 8 hours. There was no cleanup time involved, as I clean as I go, so at least I didn't have a lot of dirty dishes to look forward to after the game. Superbowl is one of the few times each year that I get to indulge my deep fried food fantasies, and I can't wait until Superbowl, 2010! Copyright(c) 2009 eRench Productions, Inc. All rights reserved. This site has been on the web since December 22, 2002. Web page design has been created by eRench Productions, Inc., custon photography for any occasion...
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