Photo by Jimmy Eagle | Styled by Kari Setterholm
The Super Bowl requires super snacking, that's clear. Throwing a party for the big game requires epic commitment, which is why snack stadiums or “snackadiums” have blitzed YouTube and Pinterest for the last few years. These food displays take the shape of football stadiums: a competition-level buffet for Sunday gatherings, each one trying to outdo the next.
But up here in the #North, with our heritage of pillaging and marauding, a stadium seemed so … passive. How better to plunder through that smorgasbord than on the ultimate SKOL Viking Snack Ship—much like the one in front of U.S. Bank Stadium? (Fun fact: In Norwegian, a Viking warship is a snekke.)
Of course, every bit and bite needed to come from a Minnesota company: from the tins of SPAM breaking the Boom Chicka Pop waves, to the billowing Freddy’s Lefse sail, back to the rudder formed by cans of Surly, Summit, Steel Toe, and Lift Bridge. From figurehead to stern, the ship delivers more than five feet of snacking. We think our Snack Ship blows any other attempts out of the water. Get out your horns, and build one yourself! Here's how we did it:
How-To Guide
Plan Your Space: Our Snack Ship was over five feet long, so think about where you want to set up. Even if you build a smaller one, it's best to commandeer a table that people can walk around both sides, as they commence snacking. Give a Viking easy access to her food, to avoid snack rage.
The Head/Frontpiece: We used one box of Honey Nut Cheerios to make our dragon head. You'll need the whole box because your first try at molding a head out of marshmallow-treat recipe will likely suck (mine super did). Remember: Vikings feel no shame. We stuck ours on top of a cheese tower with curds and cubes pierced into floral foam for structure. We used Nut Goodies for head fins and backed that baby up with corn dogs from Schwan's.
Whatever you stack under the dragon head should be formidable. Like local beer. We pulled a mix of local favorites—sour beer bombers from Fair State and Schell's, tall boys from Utepils and 612 Brew, and cans from Summit. I think you should have two local hot sauces, Cry Baby Craig's and Double Take's Carolina Reaper so that you can choose your own adventure. And of course, SPAM. For Snack Ship flair, have your ship breaking in waves of Boom Chicka Pop, like we did.
The Hull and Guts: To create the main snacking area of your ship, the smorgasbord inside the hull, you don't need fancy cookware, you just need those disposable aluminum pans you can pick up in three-packs at most grocery stores. Grab a bunch of sizes, from the deep lasagna pans to the loaf pans to the rounds, so that you can get creative with your placement. You'll be stacking them on top of each other (tip: and taping them together with duct tape) to create the height you'll need to match the hull.
The Sides: For the sides of the Snack Ship, we chose Davanni's hoagies made with ciabatta bread. They are both sturdy and delicious, and you can go nuts with the variety of fillings or just pick one kind of sub to rule them all (we chose turkey). This boat took 75 six-inch sandwiches (give or take a few that might have been eaten along the way), stacked three sammies tall. You might need some skewers to keep things perched nicely. We wanted to do corndog oars, but ended up liking the double pretz action better: Old Dutch rods and Schwan's Bavarian, or Aki's Bread Haus has fresh rolls, too.
The Sail: We were dead set that our Snack Ship should have a lefse sail, so we took some balsa wood (found at most craft stores) and created a frame on which to drape our sheets of Freddy's Lefse. Bonus points if you roll your own, lefse that is. Did we gild the lily by encasing the sail mast in mini-donuts? Even so, Vikings like pretty things, too.
The Rudder: This should be beer. The bottom row is supported by Surly's Todd the Axe Man, more cans of Summit, tallboys of Liftbridge (root beer, this is a long night), and Steel Toe's Size 7 Bomber.
The Buffet: You can stack your ship with whatever you like, but to make it a Minnesota-grade event, do as we did. From stem to stern: Chex Mix, Heggie's Pizza (cut it into squares or turn in your horns), Schwan's Mozzie Sticks, Totino's Pizza Rolls (like 90 of them), Double Take's Machismo Salsa, Kowalski's Caliente Guacamole (which has enough kick to make sure Sven doesn't stand there and hork the whole bowl before kick-off), Food Should Taste Good Chips, Old Home Spinach Dip, Holy Land Hummus, dipping veg like carrots, celery, and purple cauliflower from Kowalski's.
There you have it, Norse warriors! Get out there and pillage your grocery store and make it happen!
Sign up for our newsletter to get inside access to the latest local food and dining buzz.
