Super Bowl Party Trays in Brooklyn for a Living Room, Not a Table

Why is Super Bowl food a different problem from dinner in Brooklyn?

Because nobody sits down. A watch party is a long grazing session in front of a screen, with people eating standing up, sitting on the arm of a sofa, or balancing a plate on a knee while shouting at a television. Food that requires a table, a fork and both hands is the wrong food, no matter how good it is.

So the order isn't a smaller version of a dinner order. It's built around a different question: what can somebody eat one-handed, without looking down, at any point across a long afternoon and evening?

What should be on a Super Bowl tray order?

Protein you can pick up, one rich side people go back to, and enough of both that the second half isn't a scavenge.

The core from our catering menu is Fried Chicken Suya at $120, Pan Fried Chicken at $100 and Mac & Cheese at $90. Add Pan Shrimp at $125 or Pan Whiting at $115 if you want something on the table that isn't chicken. All full-pan prices, all party trays, nothing priced by the plate.

Two proteins is the number most watch parties want. One is thin by the second half, three is usually one more than a living room can physically hold once you've found somewhere to put drinks. If you're choosing between a third protein and a bigger version of the first two, the bigger version wins almost every time, because the failure people remember is an empty tray at the point in the evening when everybody wanted more.

Which trays survive a whole game in a Brooklyn living room?

The test is simple. Does the tray still work an hour after it was opened, at room temperature, without anybody tending it?

Why does fried chicken suya belong at a watch party?

Because a watch party spread gets repetitive fast, and suya is the thing that breaks it up.

Suya is grilled meat under a dry spice mixture built on ground peanuts. On chicken it gives you a tray that eats exactly like fried chicken, with your hands and no ceremony, but tastes like nothing else on the table. At $120 for a full pan it is a small step up from Pan Fried Chicken at $100 and it changes the character of the whole order.

If people ask how hot ours comes out, ring 718-799-7160 and ask us directly. A guess off a webpage isn't worth much on that one.

Do you need a starch at a Super Bowl party in Crown Heights?

Less than you would at a dinner, and this is where watch party ordering genuinely differs from every other kind.

At a seated meal the starch is the foundation. In a living room it's the thing that goes untouched, because rice off a paper plate on your lap is a nuisance and mac and cheese isn't. Most watch party orders are better off spending that money on a second protein than on a rice tray. If your crowd eats late and heavy, add one. If people are grazing from the first quarter onward, skip it.

How do you keep trays hot from kickoff to the fourth quarter?

Don't open everything at the start. That's the single mistake that turns a good order into a lukewarm one.

Put out one protein and the mac, keep the rest covered, and bring the second tray out at halftime so the back half of the party gets food that is still hot. Foil stays on until people are eating. Pans don't get stacked. A low oven holds a tray far better than a countertop does. We went into this properly in keeping catering trays warm through a long serving window, and a watch party is the hardest version of that problem because the serving window is the entire event.

What a Super Bowl order is not

It isn't a banquet. A seated awards dinner for a team, with a head table and a programme, is a completely different order with a completely different shape, and we covered that separately in sports banquet catering in Brooklyn. Don't order one when you mean the other.

It is also not a holiday meal. A Thanksgiving catering order in Brooklyn is built around a table everybody sits at, and a Kwanzaa Karamu spread is built around a room eating together at one time. A watch party is the opposite of both. Everybody eats separately, at their own pace, facing the same direction.

What does a Super Bowl tray order cost in Brooklyn?

You can price it from the numbers above without calling anyone, which is the reason we publish them. Fried Chicken Suya at $120 and Mac & Cheese at $90 is a lean two-tray order. Add Pan Fried Chicken at $100 for a third. Add Pan Shrimp at $125 or Pan Whiting at $115 if you want seafood on the table. Every figure is a full pan.

Two things we won't print. How far one pan goes depends on how long people are grazing and what else is out, so we size that with you rather than publishing a headcount that would be wrong for most living rooms. What time an order can be ready on a given day, and whether it comes to you or you collect it from 1172 Park Place in Crown Heights, are both worth a phone call.

The whole tray list is on our catering menu, and the rest of the year is laid out in our guide to holiday catering across the Brooklyn calendar. One call to 718-799-7160 and somebody will ask you how many are coming over, which is the only number this order really turns on.