Every worthwhile sports bar appetizer, ranked by pure personal preference
Credit: Travel Long Island
6. Mozzarella sticks
It physically pains me to leave mozzarella sticks out of the top 5, given that I love them deeply and they would be in consideration for both my death row and desert island meals. Mozz sticks are also an excellent appetizer staple, checking all the most important boxes: fried, cheese-focused, served with your choice of dipping sauce.
But lo, we’ve reached the point of the list where it’s no longer a matter of “is this a great sports bar appetizer?” but rather, “is this better than the remaining sports bar appetizers?” And as much as I love mozz sticks, I just can’t name it a top 5 sports bar app.
(When I was in high school, my mom would get these really great sticks from a door-to-door bulk frozen food salesman, which was a thing where I grew up. My mom has since informed me that this salesman was super creepy, but she still bought from him because she knew how much I loved those sticks. That’s love.)
5. Cheese curds
One time, I went to Madison, Wisconsin for three days with a group of friends and we ate fried cheese curds at every single meal. On the second night — four meals in — we cooked dinner at our Airbnb and we fried our own cheese curds. The really real thing is that before heading home, two additional cheese-curd-featuring meals later, when we stopped for the tried and true ritual of loading up the trunk with Spotted Cow, we bought more cheese curds.
That’s how good cheese curds are.
4. Sampler platter
A sampler platter is the No. 4 sports bar appetizer because ordering a sampler platter featuring any of the foods that came before it on this list is a better idea than ordering a full order of said food. So, while mozzarella sticks are the light of my life, nine out of 10 times, I’m still making the decision to load up on mozz sticks with some jalapeno poppers and some tots in a pick-3 trio platter.
When I, as a grown adult, was biding time at a TGI Friday’s waiting for the traffic to clear after a concert in the suburbs, a friend and I ordered a sampler platter of sticks, skins and a mystery app no one can remember so it was probably onion rings. That sampler platter was the smartest decision I made all year. (Sidebar: TGI Friday’s sticks are actually pretty trash. [Also, never forget this fine and groundbreaking piece of mozz stick journalism.])