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Here are a few places where you can get your meal for free – if you’re up to the challenge of wolfing down ten percent of your body weight in one sitting.
1. The Beer Barrel Belly Buster
Denny’s Beer Barrel Pub (Clearfield, Pennsylvania)
If you scoff at the idea of a quarter pounder, maybe Denny’s 15-pounder will wipe the smile off of your face. The 20-inch patty comes on a 17-inch bun and includes two onions, a whole head of lettuce, 25 slices of cheese, three tomatoes and lots of mayo, mustard, relish and ketchup. If you and a friend can get the whole thing down in three hours or less, you’ll get the $30 burger for free.
Apparently that wasn’t enough for Denny, though. Just last year, he introduced the 123-pound burger. That’s not a typo. One hundred and twenty-three pounds. It’ll set you back $379, but you get 80 pounds of meat, a pound of lettuce, ketchup, relish, mustard and mayo, 160 slices of cheese, five onions, 12 tomatoes, two pounds of banana peppers, 33 pickles and, of course, a 30-pound bun. [Image courtesy of Offroaders.com.]
2. 12-Egg Omelets
Beth’s Café (Seattle, Washington)
Looking for a hearty breakfast (and skyrocketing cholesterol)? Look no further than Beth’s Café in Seattle. They serve omelets in two sizes there – six eggs for the light eater, 12 eggs for the truly hungry. The omelets come with all-you-can-eat hashbrowns, too. (Note: no prize at this place, just an impressive bullet point to add to your eating resume.)
[Photo courtesy of the Official Wedding Website of Jeff & Lisa.]
3. The Texas King
The Big Texan Steak Ranch (Amarillo, Texas)
The Texas King is a whopping 72 ounces of steak. That’s four pounds. It will set you back $72, unless you can finish the entire meal – which includes the steak, a buttered roll, shrimp cocktail, a salad, beans and a potato – in which case it’s on the house. More than 7,000 people have succeeded at the challenge since it started in 1960. Frank Pastore, pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds, finished the entire meal in nine and a half minutes in 1987, which is the record. It wasn’t his first finish, though, just the fastest – he had completed the challenge six times prior to that.
4. Belly Buster Challenge
Pizza Party (Santa Clara, California)
There are some pretty stringent rules to enter the Belly Buster Challenge (a 20″ pizza). Here’s a sampling:
• One person must eat ONE BELLY BUSTER pizza made with cheese and two toppings in one hour or less
• Entire pizza must be eaten including the crust
• You may consume water or any other beverage
• We will supply water, you pay for any other drinks
• No dipping the pizza in the beverage
• You must keep the pizza down until all the pizza is consumed
• Management is the sole judge of completion of the challenge
• If you can’t keep it down YOU CLEAN IT UP
• You may not win more than once
But the reward is great: for eating a whole 20″ pizza in less than an hour, you get your entry fee back (half the price of the pizza), a t-shirt, a picture immortalizing your efforts on the wall at the restaurant, a certificate and a free extra large pizza every month for the next year.
You can read about one man’s 37-minute triumph over the Belly Buster (and two of his friends) here. You can also watch video of it here. Alas, champion competitive eater Joey Chestnut doesn’t live too far from Santa Clara and came in to break the record again. His time? A mere 15 minutes.
5. Monster Burritos
Pinata’s Mexican Grill (Bethpage, New York)
Yeah, two burritos doesn’t really sound like they would be too much of a challenge to eat, even given a time limit. But when the burritos are three pounds each, the story kind of changes. Pinata’s has a Wall of Shame for those who fail in their attempt and a Wall of Fame for those who succeed. From what I can tell, only two pictures reside on the Wall of Fame, and those two pictures feature competitive eaters “Krazy Kevin” Lipsitz and Don “Moses” Lerman.
6. Cold Sweat Ice Cream
Sunni Sky’s (Angier, North Carolina)
Spicy ice cream? Yep. So spicy, in fact, customers have to sign a waiver before they even taste it. It’s mixed with three types of pepper and two types of hot sauce. One of the first customers to try it had to go to the bathroom pretty much immediately and throw up. He’s had it several times since then and hopes to go for the record – 14 ounces in one sitting.
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Comments (15)
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that’s… just gross. it always boggles my mind that not only can people sit down and eat that much food, but that anyone would WANT to.
although, the spicy ice cream really sounds unpleasant. lol
that might be funny to watch.
i like the style of the pizza one- you can’t keep it down you can clean it up. lol
posted by Sue on 11-27-2008 at 12:28 pm
Out here in San Diego, there’s a 12 egg omlette challenge at the Broken Yolk cafe. The thing is loaded with chili. If you eat it all, you get your name on a plaque on the wall, a tee shirt and the $20 omlette is on the house.
posted by Jill on 11-27-2008 at 4:55 pm
Does anyone really wonder why Americans are fat? I never understood eating contest or challenges like these, esp when so many people in the world (and the USA!) are starving.
posted by Logan on 11-27-2008 at 8:35 pm
@Logan
The obesity title now belongs to Australia, first of all. Google it, as we cannot post links here.Secondly, while I myself can hardly look at this stuff without feeling as though I have had a ten course meal, making or buying it has no impact whatsoever on the starving. I’m sure you are not eating any less because people are starving.
posted by MN on 11-28-2008 at 6:21 am
Like the content-driven ad; “Lose 43 lb in 10 weeks!” So less than 30 weeks to lose the 123 pounder. Captcha; insane interests :-)
posted by Matt on 11-29-2008 at 2:21 pm
Certainly will look up the Australia fact…difficult to believe from what I saw when I was in the USA in August. :-P
As for starving people, it absolutely makes a difference. Instead of holding these contests or wasting this food on people who are already obese (or will just chuck it up), how about feeding the excesses to those who truly need it? It should be embarrassing for America (and other countries) to hold contests knowing full well there are people who could use a good meal.
posted by Logan on 11-29-2008 at 5:08 pm
@MN
I saw the study you were referring to, but a new one has since come out. The one you referenced is based on an 2005 study in OZ. However, a 2007 study in the US shows that a whopping 34% of Americans are obese (click my name for article).
As for me eating less, I certainly don’t participate in eating contests, or eat just to show I can eat a lot of something.
posted by Logan on 11-29-2008 at 5:26 pm
@Logan
I will have to look that up. Regardless, obesity is an individual problem, and you will find that most obese people don’t actually run around participating in eating contests.
I’m not saying that there aren’t a lot of obese people in the States, but it hardly defines America.
Also, restaurants do not give food away, so what they do with their food, how they sell it, and what contests they hold are really their own business. While it would be nice of them to be more generous, that’s not how a business is run.
I don’t participate in such contests either, but if the starving is such an issue with you, do your part and don’t worry about anyone else.
posted by MN on 11-30-2008 at 7:10 am
I guess what gets me is that everyone feels that they can bash Americans for being fat as though no one else in the world is capable of being obese. Walk around my town on market day, and as the only American here, I can guarantee that most everyone is fatter than I am.
I also find that when people bash “fat America”, it seems to make it ok to make fun of fat people. That’s never ok, just as it’s never ok to bash other cultures when your understanding of them is limited to stereotyping and an occasional visit.
posted by MN on 11-30-2008 at 7:27 am
Just to add, the idea that all Americans are fat is like assuming that all British people have bad teeth and are drunk. It’s not nice, is it, because it’s not true.
Since my move to the UK, I went from a natural size zero to a more normal size 6. It’s not because I have made the effort to do so.
posted by MN on 11-30-2008 at 7:48 am
I’ve eaten at Denny’s before, it’s just a few minutes off I-80.
They also have a two pound in one hour challenge where you get back 50% of the price and a three pound 1.5 hour challenge that’s on the house if you’re successful.
It’s a neat little bar, if you travel I-80 check it out.
posted by Jason on 11-30-2008 at 9:22 am
You cant take BMI as an indicator or obesity. I’m a college athlete, work out every day, and my BMI is 30.1. That makes me obese, but my actual body fat percentage hovers around 8%. Most people would say I am in extremely good shape but if you only use BMI to measure obesity the results are skewed.
posted by Chris on 11-30-2008 at 6:03 pm
Being fat isn’t a culture or a race. American’s most certainly don’t have a monopoly on being fat…it just seems like it!
posted by gInKs on 11-30-2008 at 9:21 pm
@ Logan
It’s funny you mention that they should use the food for people that can’t afford it. I live in NYC and as you may know we have the hot dog eating contest here. Every year at this contest which you say is keeping people that need food from getting it they give 10,000 hot dogs to the homeless and shelters.
posted by Tom on 12-1-2008 at 2:15 am
I always wondered why restaurants don’t give leftovers to starving people in their own locality. However, someone told me that it’s because of liability issues. If someone gets sick, they can sue. Perhaps another sad sign of the times…
posted by CK on 12-1-2008 at 6:17 pm