Checklist for successful Super Bowl party

The (Fort Myers, Fla.) News-Press and Gannett News Service

• Select recipes that enable you to do most of the chopping and cooking ahead of time so you can enjoy the game and your guests.
• Make cooking a participatory sport. If guests hang out in the kitchen, give them a job to do. You are the coach, so you call the plays.
• Let guests serve themselves. A casual buffet provides the perfect lineup for entertaining football crowds.
• Keep it simple. You can't watch the game if you're watching the stove. If you make the main dish ahead perhaps chili or pot roast, you'll only need to make a salad and slice bread just before the game for a complete meal, adding some items for people to eat for snacks.
• Have plenty of food on hand for fans who keep rushing back for more.
• Check for special diets and make plenty of nonalcoholic beverages available.
• Have a list ready for when guests say, "What can I bring?"
• Set up the perfect playing field by decorating your house with a football theme. You can use football jerseys, cleats, football memorabilia, kneepads and shoulder pads. Add yard lines to the floor and set up some homemade goal posts.
• Encourage guests to wear team T-shirts or sweatshirts or dress in team colors.
• Cut down kitchen time by buying pre-shredded or chopped cheese and vegetables.
• Supermarkets and delicatessens can prepare cheese, meat and vegetable trays ready to place on the table.
• Foods — especially those with a mayonnaise, egg or sour cream base — should be thrown away if left out for more than two hours.
• Provide plenty of comfortable seating in front of the TV for everyone. Get creative and use ottomans or large pillows.
• Provide each of your guests with a small Nerf football as a party favor — and something to toss around if the game gets dull.