By George Brown
Are you still feeling the effects of stuffing 4,500 calories into your belly last Thursday? Yes, 4,500 – that’s the number of calories the Caloric Control Council says the average American consumes on Thanksgiving Day. Keep in mind this is just an average. Children and vegan family members typically consume less than 4,500 calories, which means someone (and you know who you are) consumes a whole lot more. The Caloric Control Council also says there is direct correlation between the expansion of gastrointestinal girth during the Thanksgiving meal and the likelihood of passing out on the couch in a self inflicted tryptophan coma.
Tryptophan, as you may know, is an amino acid found in turkey and other poultry. It triggers serotonin pleasure sensors in the brain that produce melatonin – that wonderful sleep inducing chemical we all need to rest peacefully. Add a heaping portion of mashed potatoes and gravy, green bean casserole, candied yams, cranberry sauce, a couple of dinner rolls slathered with butter, and a generous slice of pumpkin pie topped with whipped cream, and you have a tryptophan sugar laden potion powerful enough to make you sleep as deeply, if not as long, as Rip Van Winkle.
I confess to being one of those above average Americans who consume more than 4,500 calories – somewhere in the vicinity of 8,000 to 10,000 is probably a safe estimate. To be fair, this includes pre-meal drinks and snacks, and post meal desserts. I like to think of it as a measure of my thankfulness.
As I used a dinner roll to wipe my plate clean for the third time last Thursday, I happen to think of a story I heard on the news the week before. You may have heard it too. It was about a fellow named Joey Chestnut downing a bite shy of 9½ pounds of turkey in 10 minutes to set a new world record for turkey eating. “Heck”, I thought to myself, “I bet I just ate that much turkey; it just took me a little longer than 10 minutes to do it.”
I had made my way to the couch and was on the verge of slipping into a tryptophan stupor, but I managed to fight it off and asked Yvonne to bring me a piece of pumpkin pie and my laptop. “Whatever for?”, she asked.
“I’ve decided to do some research about becoming a competitive eater”, I told her.
Yvonne rolled her eyes but dutifully brought the piece of pie and laptop to me. Between bites of pie I googled – “How to become a competitive eater.”
I soon found myself on the homepage of Major League Eating, an organization recognized worldwide as the undisputed authority on competitive eating. Major League Eating sanctions and conducts nearly 100 competitive eating events each year, such as the World Turkey Eating Championship, The World Twinkies Eating Championship, and the grandaddy of all eating competitions, Nathan’s Hotdog Eating contest, held annually at Coney Island on July 4.
Major League Eating maintains a ranking of the top 50 competitive eaters, and Joey Chestnut is ranked #1 in the world. In addition to the Nathan’s hotdogs and buns record (69 consumed in 10 minutes), Joey’s records include apple pie eating (4.4 pounds in 8 minutes}, asparagus (12.9 pounds in 10 minutes), fish tacos (11.25 pounds in 5 minutes), pork ribs (13.76 pounds in 12 minutes), plus at least a half dozen other records.
Most competitive eaters are men, but more than a few women chow down right along side of the men. In fact, four of the top ten competitive eaters in the world are women. Among these, Sonya Thomas, a petite 47 year old Korean woman, stands out. Known as the Black Widow, and sometimes referred to as leader of the “Four Horseman of the Esophagus”, Thomas has a mouth full of food eating records. These include, Vienna sausages (8.31 pounds in 10 minutes), baked beans (8.4 pounds in 2 minutes 47 seconds), cheesecake (11 pounds in 9 minutes), Chicken nuggets (80 nuggets in 5 minutes), chili cheese fries (8 pounds 2 ounces in 10 minutes}, plus a number of other belly ache records.
This was all interesting, but what stood out most was the fact that not a single one of the top 50 competitive eaters appears to be over the age of 50. Clearly there is room for a senior division of competitive eating, so right there on the spot I shot an email off to the folks at Major League Eating, proposing they establish a senior division. I even took the liberty of proposing a few categories – the World Ensure Drinking Championship, the World Fiber One Eating Championship, and the World Prune Eating Championship.
Of course there’s more to competitive eating than winning $1,000 for eating a hundred prunes in 10 minutes. The real money is in endorsements, commercials, and brand marketing to sell t-shirts, caps, and canes with your name and likeness (actually mine) emblazoned on them. Effective branding requires having a catchy name like “Joey Chestnut”. I told Yvonne about the email I was working on and she immediately said, “Why don’t you tell them your name is Hairy Coconut.” She was careful to point out the spelling of the word hairy.
Yvonne was just trying to be silly, but I loved the idea so I signed the email, “Senior Eater, Hairy Coconut.” I can’t wait to hear what Major League Eating thinks of my idea for a senior division. In the mean time I’m going to start practicing my competitive eating techniques by eating a hundred prunes.