Drink Wine At Your Super Bowl Party, You Cowards
A lot of former NFL players are very into pairing vino with party food.
There's a very specific image of what a Super Bowl snack table looks like: wings, dips, and lots and lots of beer. If you're not shotgunning a brewski during the big game, are you even a real football fan, bro? Well, according to a handful of former NFL players, real bros drink vinos, and they have the pairing suggestions to prove it.
The Washington Post checked in with three former football stars who traded in their helmets and cleats for wine glasses and grapes—and it turns out the career pivot is more common than one might think. Hall of Fame quarterback Charles Woodson, who won a Super Bowl with the Green Bay Packers in 2011, now has his own line of California Wines called Intercept (get it?). Will Blackmon, who played in the 2012 Super Bowl with the New York Giants, now curates wine cellars for professional athletes with his company The Wine MVP. And longtime New England Patriot quarterback Drew Bledsoe started up Bledsoe Wine Estates in Washington.
"I'll probably start the first half with a few glasses of cabernet sauvignon, then enjoy some bourbon," Woodsan says of his game day ritual in WaPo. "I'm more interested in savoring and enjoying what I'm eating and drinking, and there's definitely room for that in sports."
So what are some go-to pairings from these experts? Chardonnay seems to be big across the board, washing down creamy dips and buttery lobster rolls in equal measure. For your burgers, meatballs, and charcuterie boards, reach for a robust red. If you want to find the perfect bottle to pair with winning the Super Bowl, Blackmon specifically suggests the Double Diamond Cabernet Sauvignon from Schrader Cellars, an ode to that flashy championship ring.
The best advice, though, comes from Bledsoe: "More wine is always better," he says. Cheers to that.