The German magazine Der Spiegel has an English article and gallery about La Tomatina, a annual tomato fight that will be held in Buñol, Spain tomorrow. During the event, 150,000 kg (330,000 lb.) of tomatoes are ruined. Despite wasting orders of magnitude more food than any American eating contest, the event does not seem to have drawn the same amount of criticism that competitive eating does.

• Juliet Lee has an Ash Creek rib contest report
• Clam eating contest in Seattle Saturday, first prize is $100
• Ryan Nerz podcast interview in Conversations on the Road
• Furious Pete is doing marketing research on a Furious Pete hat
• A Washington Post article on the rise of college Food Studies programs reports that “Horsemen of the Esophagus” is required reading one course.
• The Wall Street Journal reports that Japanese convenience store chain Lawson announced an annual increase in same store sales of 13%. Gal Sone endorsed a line of meals for Lawson in May.

• York (PA) Revolution to offer all you can eat seats where you can enjoy the company of former Baltimore Orioles
• Japanese commercial featuring a ramen eating contest
• Pat Bertoletti posts a picture of a hot dog training session (see above) to a yardbarker comment (The Waffle House belt is to remind Pat that Joey can be beat)
• Kansas State Games to have a hot dog eating contest July 18
• UK hot dog eating contest May 23
• Twins closer Joe Nathan to appear (but not compete) at tomorrow’s Nathan’s qualifier
• Today is Cookie Jarvis’ birthday according to a comment
• Furious Pete has posted an article about the Collegiate Nationals to bodybuilding.com
• China and the Philippines ban conversion of rice paddies to golf courses (via Freakonomics)
• Chicago Nathan’s qualifier next weekend to take place in Matteson
  

NPR has an article about the effect of American internment and occupation on Japanese and Japanese-American cuisine:

Shousei Hanayama, the priest at the Buddhist Temple in Watsonville, Calif., remembered that after the war, American soldiers in Okinawa brought hot dogs and introduced them into the island culture.

Hanayama noted that hot dogs are still a part of the Japanese culture, pointing to the story of Takeru Kobayashi, who can eat 63 hot dogs in under 12 minutes. The winner of six consecutive Nathan’s Coney Island Hot Dog Eating Contests, Kobayashi revolutionized and popularized competitive eating with a technique called “Japanesing,” separating hot dog from bun as he crams to victory.

There is currently a poll on MSNBC asking the question “Are competitive eating contests harmless celebrations of gastronomic greatness or sheer gluttony?”

The choices are: 1) Lighten up, people! They’re a belly-full of innocent fun. 2) With a third of Americans now obese, these contests are in bad taste. 3) I don’t know

The anti-CE voters are currently leading 51% to 44%

The website for the student newspaper of Texas Christian University has an anti competitive eating editorial:

Anything I can do from the comfort of my own home shouldn’t be considered a sport.

I have fat friends that sit around all day and drink untold amounts of Mountain Dew and suck on Pixie Stixs. Do I tell them to go challenge Joey Chestnut and Sonya Thomas in the glamorous world of public overeating?

No.

I tell them to hit the treadmill like Marion Jones (minus the steroids) so they can live to see 25.

(From So Good Blog)Manuel Lora makes the following proposals in his blog:

Eating contests must be closely watched by a regulatory agency. I propose the following pieces of legislation:

A) Participants must be licensed. If we license automobile drivers, why can’t we license competitive eaters? Some of them often receive monetary and in-kind prices and as such they are employees subject to regulation.

B) Participants must be insured. Because the eaters might have a higher than average incidence of heart burn and other complications, it makes perfect sense of them to have primary and secondary insurance otherwise hospitals will have to bear the cost of the eating fetishists.

C) Competitive eating organizers shall be required to provide to audiences brochures and other instructional material about healthy eating. Children who witness these monstrous spectacles could very well be disturbed, their lives forever changed. Society must do whatever possible to prevent damaging the children.

D) Whether it is pies or hot dogs, organizers must provide nutritional information to eaters and the public. This way everyone can see the insane number of calories that they are consuming. Perhaps a “shock and awe” campaign is what we need to eliminate obesity once and for all.

The Eagle Tribune has an article about Andover, MA resident Paul MacInnis, who is on a quest to ban all eating contests.

After he stops the Nathan’s contest, he said he’ll move to ban all professional competitive eating.

He has the option of introducing a bill to the Massachusetts Legislature — which he’d have to do by January. Andover Town Clerk Randy Hanson said it wouldn’t be possible to ban competitive eating locally because the Board of Selectmen would have no authority to uphold such a ruling, even if it were voted in at town meeting.

But one thing’s for sure: MacInnis is one tough cookie, and he’s willing to do whatever it takes.

“I will not be ignored,” he said. “I will become such a pain in the neck to these people. I may be on a fool’s errand here, but I’m not going to let it go.”

The cancellation of the corn eating contest at the University of Iowa has received more publicity than most eating contests which actually take place:

ESPN.com
Des Moines Register
Reason Online
KCRG

A comment from the Des Moines Register by Calvin Jones follows:

Keep in mind this is the same University that sells triple cheese burgers and french fries in the student union cafeteria not to mention the mass quantities of alcohol they allow the well healed boosters to consume on campus, in open containers, seven hours before a Hawkeye football game. Trust me nothing is scarier than watching a drunk graduate from the class of 32 try to back out their 18 foot long land yacht onto Melrose Ave. The obesity epidemic has nothing to do with binge vegetable eating and everything to do with empty calories and sugar peddled by all of those vending machines on campus. If anything binging on vegetables would both help solve this nation’s weight problem and cripple the laxative industry.

An interview with MeMe Roth of the National Association Against Obesity conducted by Neil Cavuto on Fox News criticizing competitive eating after the Nathan’s finals can be viewed at http://youtube.com/watch?v=y1coz4elffw

The New York Times has an article assessing Kobayashi’s impact on competitive eating.

If Kobayashi loses, the contest runs the risk of losing its marquee star.

“People are attracted to the game by individuals, but then they become more familiar with the game and so there’s a path from being a fan of an individual to being a fan of the sport,” Mandelbaum said. “But I’m not sure if people watch this for the same reason people watch sports.”

Ruth passed the mantle of stardom in baseball to Lou Gehrig, among others, leaving baseball significantly stronger than it was when he started. Time will show whether the interest in hot dog-eating competitions will continue, but having Chestnut around to succeed Kobayashi may be important to keep fans watching.

(From MosesNews.com) Newsday has a column about competitive eating in which all the sources quoted are anti-C.E. except for Ryan Nerz. A poll about competitive eating is also available.

Chow.com has a column on whether it is advisable to praise a non-overweight woman’s large appetite:

Some women say they like it when people remark on their hearty appetites. Maralee Burgard, a UC Berkeley student blessed with a fast metabolism, eats such large portions that her friends know to schedule extra time when they share a meal with her. “I feel a sense of pride and empowerment that I’m a woman and can eat more than many men,” she says.

But, unfortunately, most women are anxious about their weight, regardless of their body size. Drawing attention to how much your female companion is eating could trigger feelings of insecurity: “Am I eating too much? Is my friend trying to tell me I’m fat?” You never know how confident a woman is in her relationship with food, so you should never comment on how much (or how little, for that matter) she is consuming.

stuff.co.nz has an article about a Kentucky Fried Chicken Eating contest in New Zealand. Even though the contest was an informal affair not open to the public, it still drew criticism from public officials:

The event drew the ire of Waikato District Health Board officials who said it sent the wrong message at a time when the district and country were facing an obesity epidemic.

A new blog has been started called “Eat This Blog” at t-champ.blogspot.com. The objective for the blog follows:

This Blog will follow the numerous competitive eating contests throughout America as they happen, and explain how the “sport” and its “athletes” are becoming more popular in pop culture.

The most recent post has 13 instance of competitive eating in popular culture.

USAToday.com reports that a planning subcommittee has recommended denying a permit to the San Gennaro Festival in Little Italy, which hosts an IFOCE cannoli eating contest. The committee has a second hearing on the festival tonight.

But last month the Street Activities Permits Subcommittee of the Traffic and Transportation Committee of Community Board 2 — one of hundreds of such neighborhood panels that influence everything from new skyscrapers to street names — took the unprecedented step of recommending against a permit for the feast.

“People use our hallways as toilets,” complains John Casalinuovo, a longtime resident who spoke at the hearing.

When festival officials did not attend the hearing — they say they weren’t notified — the subcommittee voted to recommend the permit be denied.

nytimes.com also has an article

nerdsonsports.com compared competitive eating to another sport after eating the Godzilla Burger (two half-pound beef patties, four slices of cheese, bacon and onions) at the Eagle Deli in Boston in 4 minutes

Power Gluttony and NHL brawls have more similarities than one might initially think. Both are violent and messy affairs. Both generally end with one person throwing their hands up in surrender (or passing out). And both outwardly appear like nothing but barbaric, unplanned chaos. I want to set the record straight on that last point, though, as a lot of though goes into both pursuits.

People attending the YMCA Pancakes Days contest in Evansville, IN might want to avoid any contest afterparties put on by the local competitors. CourierPress.com reports that the contest was won by a sex offender who failed to register (the failure is attributed to a government computer mixup.) The winner was victorious for the fourth year in a row. The man he tied with in his first win in 2004 is charged with a stabbing death.

Kobayashi eating 58 bratwursts at the Johnsonville Bratwurst contest made the Sheboygan Press’ list of notable 2006 events. Clarence Mertz’s efforts to suppress that contest made the list of offbeat events.

(Thanks Berenice Baker) The BBC blog has an entry about whether they should have covered last month’s mince pie eating contest. The entry currently has 19 comments one of which reads:

By covering it, you endorse it? Rubbish. All this worrying and fussing is silly. I have a very hard time indeed believing that, after seeing the piece, any child would think “I know! I’ll try shoving several packs of mince pies in my mouth, too!” Kids aren’t going to get fat because of coverage of mince pie eating competitions. It’s the equivalent of suggesting that, after watching a football match, a fat child will suddenly be inspired to lose all their excess weight and go and play football. If that was the case, all we’d have to do is shove fat children in front of “Sky Sports” and the problem would be solved.

The Manchester Evening news reports that the “World Pie Eating Championship”, held at Harry’s Bar in Wallgate has altered its rules to appease the health lobby. The contest format was originally an eat all you can in 3 minutes, but now the winner will be the eater who can eat a single meat pie in the fastest amount of time. A vegetarian pie eating contest was also added.

This is a different contest from the IFOCE endorsed mince pie eating contest that will be held a week from now.

updated this is London and metro.co.uk also have articles

The East Valley Tribune has an article about the Heart Attack Grill’s dispute with nursing organizations in which the owner of the restaurant, Jon Busso is quoted as saying “To say there is any massagany (sic) here is absolutely ridiculous”

It is somewhat difficult to accept the denial of misogyny in light of the restaurant’s blog entry for October 25:

The entire Grill was taken aback at the sight of this woman as she literally decimated a Quadruple Bypass Burger in front of our very eyes. Every macho man at the bar suddenly gave up his chauvinistic preconceptions of meat being a “man’s game” when she put us all to shame.

SADLY THOUGH, we found out that she was cheating! It turns out that she’s four months pregnant, so it’s obvious the little guy inside of her was helping her eat all that beef in record time. Our Quadruple Bypass Burger challenge is a sport of honor among gentlemen. Her cheating brought such disgrace to the Grill that we had to take her out back and work her over a bit. Hey, I know what you’re all thinking, but we confined our punches to the upper rib cage section to avoid the fetus. I mean we’re not Barbarians for Christ sakes!

Absolutely hilarious, if you find violence against pregnant women a laughing matter. The claims of male superiority in meat eating are difficult to accept given that Sonya Thomas is the only person to win the 9 pound Barrick Burger contest and Kate Stelnick and Lori Weiss are the only people to complete Denny’s Beer Barrel Pub’s 96er burger. Closer to the Grill, 115 pound Becky White of Tucson has completed the 72 ounce steak at the Big Texan Grill.

The nurses have put out a press release detailing their grievances against the restaurant.

In a recent blog entry, Dave “megamunch” Shoffner announces that for every item of food he eats in competition, he will donate the list price of that item to America’s Second Harvest

The Sheboygan Times has an editorial on the Johnsonville bratwurst contest which is generally positive.

Advertising Age has an article about the difficulties IFOCE has experienced obtaining mainstream sponsors like national fast-food chains.