Game Day Guacamole

When you grow up in Denver, you either love the Broncos or you hate them, but you're rarely indifferent. When the weather starts to cool and the leaves begin thinking about changing colors, the Denver fan, heck any football fan, knows a special time is drawing near...football season.

Football season will forever hold a special place in my heart. It was time spent with my family growing up. It was high school football games where you screamed until you were hoarse. It was homecoming where you got to ride in in floats to buildup the big homecoming game. It was college days where campus energy rose right before the Iowa-Iowa State game, and frat houses were the place to be after Iowa kicked some Cyclone butt, which they did again yesterday. Just in case you hadn't heard.

And with football season, comes football food. Of course, one must start by putting on a handy, dandy team apron. It makes the food taste that much better. For today's season opener get together, I made guacamole, because really, guac is like little bites of heaven on a tortilla chip.

The thing about guac though is that while it's well loved and very popular, it's hard to get people to agree to the perfect version...everyone has an opinion. Should it be smooth or have chunks? Tomatoes or no tomatoes? Cilantro? Lots of garlic or just a little? Spicy or mild? The variations are endless really.

Unfortunately, it's hard to share a recipe since it's really by taste each time. In a nutshell, I started with 3 avocados, split and diced in the skins and then scooped into a bowl.

Add one small tomato, finely diced, one tbsp minced red onion and one half finely diced jalapeno. Throw in two crushed garlic cloves, the juice of one lime, a handful of finely chopped up cilantro, a bit of salt and some pepper. Stir and mash with a fork so that it's creamy, but still retains smaller chunks of avocado.

The most important part of game day guacamole is using that one, completely impractical serving dish---the one that takes up half the kitchen and only comes out a few times a year....on occasions such as opening day.

But in the end, it's worth the space it takes up. Eating guac out of a plain dish might imply that a girl doesn't bleed orange and blue. That'd be a shame.