Our Chubby Vegan Super Bowl party

So it's not really a secret that Chubby Vegan Dad loves football. I'm pretty sure I've heard on more than one occasion that he would totally leave me for Tony Romo if the opportunity presented itself. Thankfully, we live in the snowy tundra of Ohio and he appears to be happily married in Texas, so I think I'm safe for a while, anyway.

The thing is, I'm not really the biggest football fan. Actually, up until this year I don't think I ever watched a complete game. (And if I did it was in college and it wasn't because of the football, but more the party around it). And then I decided to participate in a fantasy football league. This will forever change my outlook on football. I wanted to understand football better and figured the only way I'd actually follow through with that would be if I had something on the line - like trying to win a fantasy league. Sadly, I didn't win my league (big shocker, I know), but I did finish better than .500 and I actually developed a slight crush on the sport. It probably helps that I decided whatever quarterback I got for my fantasy league would become the "team" I'd be a fan for, so the performance of Cam Newton and the Panthers certainly heightened the fun.

So despite both of our teams failing to make it to the Super Bowl, we decided to throw a big Super Bowl bash and have fun cheering on whoever was in it. (We ended up being bandwagon Seahawks fans, not because they won, but because we actually liked Richard Sherman and were in complete adoration of Derrick Coleman and his hearing loss story). Oh yeah, and the part where Coleman actually responded to the little girls and then brought their family to the Super Bowl, yeah, I was a crying, melting, mommy mess. That and I actually work for a company that works directly with others who help individuals with hearing loss, so every day I see the struggles and things people who wear hearing aids, cochlear implants and the such go through.

Either way, we just wanted an excuse to throw a party and cook a bunch of delicious food. It was also the perfect excuse for Chubby Vegan Dad and his friend to test out the home beer brewing kits we got them (some of my close friends got together this Christmas and bought all our men these home brewing kits so they could have something to do when we gabbed for hours on our "dates.") We invited over some of our closest friends (and subjected one particular couple to all vegan fare) and not surprisingly, everything seemed to go down smoothly.

When I first went vegan I found myself apologizing to people that I didn't have "their" food in my home. Then a few years deep, I started wanting others to apologize if they expected me to have "their" food in my home. Now, it's pretty much an unspoken rule. If it's a party or gig we're throwing, the food we're putting out is going to be vegan. Not because we're trying to convert everyone, but because we're passionate about our beliefs and we want to show everyone how damn delicious it can be.

And I'm pretty sure my cupcakes did the trick, FYI. Anywho, we had a hoard of unhealthy junk, including: jalapeno poppers, potato skins, cauliflower "wings," buffalo chick pea cups, chips, hummus, chocolate covered peanut butter pretzel footballs and sea salt caramel "milky way" cupcakes. Thankfully our friends brought a salad to help semi-balance out all our junky hand food.

Stay tuned because I'll be posting recipes for at least the buffalo cups and cupcakes later this month, and you really, really don't want to miss them.

SO let's hear it friends, when you throw a party do you have all vegan fare? Or if you're omnivores, would it bother you to test out the vegan food?

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• Vegan broccoflower wings
• My Super Bowl Sunday picks