Chips, dips, chains & whips

Super Bowl Snacking on the Edge of Doom

How are we all holding up? Barely? By the thinnest thread? Not really at all? Same! Post-election, and especially post-inauguration, I’ve felt baffled, angry, despondent, and, frankly, scared. Can someone just tell me if I, an extremely progressive Jewish mother of a non-binary child and a girl, should just go ahead and move to Canada, please? (In related news, I’m StephanieDit on Duolingo where I am currently learning French as quickly as possible, friend me!)

I needed to take a hiatus from BWTM because I didn’t know what to say or how to say it, and I still don’t! Everything just feels harder because there’s a program running in the back of my CPU all day that’s worried about things that feel far beyond my control.

But what can I control? This newsletter. My work. My choices (for now 😩 ). I can have impact in my community, and I can continue to model the kindness and gratitude I want to see in the world for my kids. That’s kind of it, and for now, it has to be enough.

So, thanks for popping in. Let me know how you’re holding up and what’s bringing you comfort in the comments, and maybe we’ll actually get through this together.

Image: Simply Recipes / Ciara Kehoe

The Super Bowl is on Sunday, whether you like it or not. Personally, I’m not really in the mood for Big American Sports right now, especially considering the inevitable who got more screen time, Donald Trump or Taylor Swift dialogue that’s sure to follow it. But if you know me at all, you know I really can’t pass up a Designated Food Holiday, of which The Super Bowl certainly qualifies. This year, each family member got to choose a snack to fill our snack stadium — here’s our menu:

• Pulled Pork Sliders with Slaw (Byrd’s pick)

• Chips & Guac (Hazel’s pick)

• Boneless Buffalo Wings w/ celery, cucumbers, and Blue Cheese (Seth’s pick)

• Chicago Style Pigs in a Blanket (My pick, but I’m calling them Pigs in a Parka because Chicago)

• Potato Skins (I got to pick twice because I’m the general contractor on this snack stadium)

I also developed this recipe for Jalapeño Popper Dip for Simply Recipes, so if there’s a dip-sized hole in your Super Bowl spread, I highly recommend filling it with this baddie, which I prefer with tortilla chips but could be good on Ruffles too.

lolistration by Ian Mackay

Super Bowl foods and their ilk fall into the bucket of what Eater Correspondent, Jaya Saxena, would call LOLfood, which she wrote about for Eater this week. In the article, Saxena talks about how this kind of junky, comforting, nostalgic food is trending, especially on restaurant menus right now.

It kind of feels like a moment in which our politics went low, and our food followed, hitting the lowbrow depths (but also heights) of a mozzarella stick served in a marinara-filled shot glass (it’s called a shotzarella, if you must know), and it’s probably another sign of the end times, but at least it’s a highly palatable, some might even say delicious, one.

From the article:

“Every trend is a reaction masquerading as a new idea.“ This quote haunts me with its concise brilliance.

And then there’s this:

Uncertain times, eh? There is no shortage of that. “I think the prevailing mood in general has been one of low-key dread,” says Eby, noting worries about the Trump administration and what it means for basically every aspect of life, including the restaurant industry. And when your brain is full up thinking about other, honestly more important things, the things you do for leisure often return to their most basic. “In the same way that sometimes you need to watch a show that’s extremely smooth, that you don’t need to engage with it intellectually, sometimes you need the same thing out of food,” she says.

If that doesn’t explain why I want to eat a bowl of Chicken Divan on the sofa while watching Unsellable Houses nothing does!

book club got treated to the FIRST sampling of these chips, and you better believe we felt like absolute QUEENS.

I have to give a huge shout out to my friend (and fellow book clubber), Keya Wingfield, who recently officially launched her scrumptious, craveable Indian-spiced potato chips. You can’t go in a store in Richmond, VA without seeing these chips right now, which is good for my somewhat excessive personal chip habit. I’m partial to the Black Salt flavor, which eats like a salt & vinegar chip with more personality. Another of our book club buds, Miranda, suggested dipping these beauties in the tzatziki from Stella’s Grocery, and now that’s a thing I can’t quit doing. If you happen to be in Richmond, do yourself a favor snag a bag.

C’est tout pour le moment!

xox

SG