I get next-level excited for the Oscars. I always see every movie nominated for Best Picture (or almost anyways – this year I CANNOT bring myself to get stoked on Darkest Hour) so that I can have strong opinions about the nominees and am emotionally invested in who wins.
For that reason, I always rope Alyssa and Rachel in to watching the Oscars with me. Luckily, because the broadcast is always on a Sunday, I can do so easily!
This year, we wanted to make our Oscar-watching a little bit more interesting. Sure, it’s always fun to wager a little coin on who wins, but this time we wanted to really make a fun night of it.
For us that meant glamming it up with Oscar-worthy popcorn, a signature cocktail (always), red velvet carpet cupcakes, an Oscar nominated songs playlist and a DIY edition of the classic game headbands featuring this year’s nominees. This combo will keep your Academy Award party bumpin’ through the entire ceremony.
And guys, you can do this for any award show. If you’re all about the Grammy’s and don’t care so much about Oscars then honey, you do you!
The red velvet cupcakes are courtesy of our girl Martha Stewart (love you!) You can get the recipe here. We decorated ours with gold star shaped sprinkles and baby sparklers because why wouldn’t we?!
You can download this year’s Oscar Nominee ballot from Studio DIY here.
This popcorn is so good we could barely even photograph it without eating it. It’s also super easy to make and looks pretty damn impressive (if I do say so myself).
- 1 ½ cups white chocolate molding wafers (this isn’t set in stone, you can use more or less depending on how much you like chocolate)
- 1 bag of salted popcorn (unbuttered)
- ¼ cup of gold pearlized sugar (we used Wilton brand from Michaels because it’s extra sparkly)
- Parchment paper
- Pull out a baking sheet and line it with parchment paper.
- Create a double boiler (because who honestly has one?) by filling a pot ¼ of the way full with water and placing a stainless-steel or heatproof bowl overtop, so it sits comfortably over the pot without reaching the water – here’s a handy tutorial. Use a bowl big enough to accommodate your entire bag of popcorn.
- Put your double boiler over medium heat and add the white chocolate molding wafers to the bowl. Use a spatula to stir the molding wafers as they melt.
- Once the chocolate has melted, remove the double boiler from the element and take out the bowl (use oven mitts, it will be hot AF). Add your popcorn and stir it into the melted molding wafers.
- Spread your popcorn mixture onto the baking sheet so that it’s evenly laid out.
- Sprinkle your pearlized sugar over your popcorn.
- Put the baking sheet in your fridge for 20-30 minutes so that the chocolate solidifies.
- Gently break the popcorn apart and serve.
We wanted a drink glam enough for the Oscars so obviously that meant using the leftover gold sugar from the popcorn to create something fancy. You may have heard of a Kir Royale, a traditional French cocktail consisting of Cassis topped with champagne. It’s pretty good, but we opted for a twist on the classic, grabbing Amaretto in place of Cassis (which you’ll learn that Alyssa will put in anything given the choice) to make it really golden.
You can grab the recipe here.
Let’s be honest, you can watch the live red carpet special on mute because it’s the most uncomfortable thing anyone has ever watched. It’s a special kind of cringe that runs deep in the bones. I’m literally only interested in what people are wearing. So throw on some Oscar inspired tunes!
Alyssa put together a collection of Oscar-winning and nominated songs that will simply bring the house down. It could just be called Disney Songs and Power Ballads. We started a game to see who could guess the song first and name the movie it was from. Bonus points if you guess the year it was nominated!