Super Bowl Sunday ...!

Well, it seems the whole of the United States has been struck by football fever this week (not proper football of course ... American football) as Super Bowl Sunday arrives this weekend (our equivalent to the FA Cup Final).  This year's showdown, which marks 50 years of Super Bowl, is between the Denver Broncos and the Carolina Panthers and Mr B is beyond excited as this will be the first year that he has been able to watch it at a reasonable hour (4.30pm for us here in Phoenix), rather than staying up half the night and then propping his eyes open with matchsticks and trying to stay awake at work the next day.  (Those of you that know Mr B will know that he is a complete sports fanatic and would watch tiddlywinks if it was on ...)

Ethan and I couldn't really care less, however I do want to see Coldplay's half time set and I have to confess I am looking forward to the infamous 'Super Bowl commercials' which are a HUGE thing over here (and get almost as much hype as the actual game).  There is much competition amongst the key players for the best ad and big money to be made for those that get it right - the Super Bowl is one of the world's most watched sporting events and last year attracted a record 114.4 million viewers.  Good job too as the cost for a 30 second spot is a whopping $4.5 million!  

As you might expect, drink and snack brands feature heavily ... Coca Cola, Pepsi, Budweiser ... who can forget those iconic Budweiser frogs, or the 'Whassup!' commercial which every Jack the Lad on a night out seemed to think was hilarious for months (if not years) afterwards and quickly became extremely irritating!  They did however redeem themselves somewhat though with last year's cute 'lost puppy' ad ... sniff

One of my all time favourites though has to be Volkswagen's 2011 Darth Vadar ad ...

Game-day food is equally important of course, (with the average American reportedly consuming 5,000 calories during the course of the Super Bowl!) and I think every breakfast tv show this week has had a slot (or several!) on what to make for your Super Bowl party.  Another big thing apparently, but not a popular idea with Mr B who thinks it would be far too distracting, prefering instead to disappear into his own little world ignoring anybody else in the room, jumping out of his seat clutching his head at regular intervals and shouting 'instructions' to the players every 5 minutes.

Popular choices for game-day food include chicken wings, ribs, chilli and nachos, which will be our snack of choice for tomorrow's game.  Not just any old nachos though.  Shredded beef nacho casserole if you don't mind, thanks to this recipe that I recently discovered on Pinterest and which proved to be very popular when I made it a few weeks ago for the Cardinals game (sadly the game turned out to be more disappointing).

Yummy!

For dessert, a special request from Mr B ... carrot cake.  Perhaps not your traditional game-day fare but one of his favourites.  I made one to take to our next door neighbour's birthday party last weekend where Mr B managed to hover by the dessert table and devour two large slices before I had to drag him away sulking!

Probably 5,000 calories right there ...

oooh ... is there any icing left?

Right ... I better go and make sure I have got plenty of alcohol in the fridge for tomorrow to get me through the boring bits in between the adverts ... 

Thanks for dropping by and hope you too have a Super Sunday!

TTFN

Bev x