NICKELBACK TO PERFORM DURING GREY CUP HALFTIME SHOW

"For proud Canadians like us, it's an honour to share the stage with the best teams in the league going head to head for the Grey Cup," band frontman Chad Kroeger said in a release. "With Nickelback based in Vancouver, and the game at BC Place, this is a home game for us, and we can't wait to play."

Quote from Canadian Press
11/5/2011 3:33:31 AM

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Grey Cup: Football Party Ideas

The 99th annual Grey Cup is scheduled for Sunday Nov. 27th. The game will be played at the new BC Place. You don’t want to watch it alone! Football, friends, food and drinks, all in the comfort of your own home—what better excuse to throw a great Canadian party?

That's the spirit has some awesome party ideas...

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Grey Cup: Football Party Ideas

The 98th annual Grey Cup is scheduled for Sunday Nov. 28 at 6:30 p.m. The game will be played at Commonwealth Stadium in Edmonton, Alberta. You don’t want to watch it alone! Football, friends, food and drinks, all in the comfort of your own home—what better excuse to throw a great Canadian party?

DRESSING UP YOUR GREY CUP PARTY

Creating a fun Grey Cup atmosphere is easy to do, and worth the effort. Here are a few ideas:

Encourage guests to come dressed in their favourite team colours or to wear football jerseys.
Wear a referee striped jersey as the host.
Decorate your party room with tablecloths, shirts, jackets, hats and other paraphernalia in team logos or team colours.
Add team and player posters, football equipment, pennants, and photos.
Use white tape or chalk to mark off the yard lines from the curb to your front door—this is also a fun activity to do with the kids.
Cover chair backs with team jerseys. Unless you are a huge CFL fan it may be hard to cover all the chairs with team jerseys, but even a few sports jerseys add to the atmosphere.
Welcome your guests to the party by putting a sign over the door with your name as part of the stadium name (i.e. Smith Stadium, James Field).
Set up friendly football pools to encourage even the non-fans to become involved. Create pools based not only on the outcome of the game but also more random results, like total points, “random square” pools and even the coin toss.

FEEDING THE CROWD

No grid iron gathering would be complete without snacks. It’s a long game, though, so be prepared to offer up heartier fare for your football crowd—especially if you are serving alcohol. Fun food serving ideas:

Design a buffet to resemble a concession stand to dispense the food and/or drinks.
Use items like football helmets, shoulder pads, etc. to hold baskets or bowls of food. (You might want to clean them first!)
Try Astroturf on your buffet instead of a tablecloth.

Try these snacks and appetizers for an interesting spin on this year's big game.

GREAT CANADIAN DRINKS

Football and beer always go well together, but in staying with the Canadian theme, try offering up some Caesars. The Caesar is actually a Canadian invention: It was developed in Calgary, Alberta, in 1969 by bartender Walter Chell to mark the opening of a new restaurant, "Marco's." Its popularity has grown and it is estimated that 250 million Caesars are sold every year.

Classic Caesar Punch Recipe

PRINTER FRIENDLY VERSION

6 oz vodka
36 oz Clam Tomato Cocktail
1 tsp Tabasco sauce
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

Mixing instructions

Add all ingredients to a large pitcher and stir to mix.

Rim glass with lime juice and rimmer. Fill glass with ice and pour. Garnish with celery and lime wedges. Makes eight 6-oz Caesars.

Pitcher of Caesars recipe »

Canada's favorite mixed drink is the "Caesar" and we have the perfect way to serve them to your guests and still leave you able to enjoy the game.

The Canadian Manhattan »

A true classic matched up with a classic Canadian game.

Hot coffee drink ideas »

Along with the standard coffee and pop serve up some spirited coffee and hot chocolate.

Caesar tip

Caesars are “pitcher-friendly,” and the ability to mix a pitcher of Caesars makes hosting your party even easier. To help ease that November chill, leave a bottle of Tabasco beside the bar for those who want some extra spice.

Watermelon Footballs

Bring a little fun to your party! Make your own watermelon football helmet »

Our city is brining the spirit of football out!!

It seems that everyone wants to get a piece of the Grey Cup celebrations.With just days to go before Sunday’s CFL championship between the B.C. Lions and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, the general manager of the event said on Tuesday that all the venue space is full.

“I’m sure this will be the biggest one we’ve ever hosted,” Scott Ackles said of what will be the 15th edition of the Grey Cup staged in Vancouver.

“This event is double the size of Vancouver’s 2005 Party on the Pacific [Grey Cup] — that’s what stands out in my mind,” said Ackles, who was also the GM of that event. “There are so many things occurring at this event.”

The full list of those events is available online at www.2011greycupfestival.ca. It includes everything from free, family events and concerts, a parade expected to draw 125,000 viewers and top-line entertainment at the Molson Canadian House in the Vancouver Convention Centre.

The most expensive event is the Scotiabank Show Your Colors Gala Dinner at $350 a ticket.

Forget about going to that event, though, because even though there were almost 2,000 tickets it sold out six months ago.

There will also be parties — including the traditional Calgary Stampeders’ pancake breakfast — and they will be staged in the streets, in bars and in restaurants.

The City of Vancouver has been a big part of the planning.

The Stanley Cup riots earlier this year resulted in the formation of a special group, the City Large Event Oversight Committee or CLEOC. Deputy City Manager Sadhu Johnston said CLEOC met with Grey Cup organizers many times to refine details of their plans, resulting in such changes as moving the Molson Canadian House indoors for better control of the event.

“I feel very confident in the work we’ve done to develop a really robust plan for the event and I certainly don’t foresee problems,” Johnston said.

“We have a really good partnership with all our partner agencies and the event organizers and I think it’s going to be a great weekend,” he said.

Drivers will see the first real signs of the Grey Cup festivities Wednesday with street closures in the 700 and 800 blocks of Beatty Street and the 100 and 200 blocks of Robson Street for setup of the Telus Street Festival.

Hamilton and Cambie streets will remain open for travel north and south.

The roads will reopen at about 2 p.m. Monday.

B.C. Place Stadium is also prepared for the event, with approximately 1,500 staff trained and ready to work at the event.

There were complaints about lineups getting into the venue Sunday for the Western final between the Lions and Edmonton Eskimos but Graham Ramsay, director of sales and marketing for the facility, said the key for fans is to use the appropriate entrance.

That entrance is indicated on their ticket.

Ramsey said that on Sunday more than 14,000 fans used Gate A to get into the building but just 3,000 went through Gate G.

So if the lineup is huge, try another entrance.

Concessions are also going to be well stocked, as opposed to a chaotic opening night for the refurbished stadium earlier this year.

Ramsay said the Grey Cup crowd is expected to chow down on 20,000 hotdogs, 10,000 hamburgers, 17,000 litres of soft drinks, more than 6,000 slices of pizza, well over 4,500 orders of nachos, more than 6,000 buckets of popcorn and 35,000 litres of beer.