Three Men, Two Pizzas

An interesting situation arises when two different friends want to complete the same team pizza challenge with you. From my standpoint, I came to the only reasonable conclusion: complete the challenge separately with both guys. And do it on the same day.

Rosati's in La Quinta, CA offers a 16" stuffed crust pizza challenge for two. You gotta pick six toppings, and as usual I recommend going all vegetable. Veggies lose more water weight when they cook, and they are less salty than meat toppings so you'll probably take in less water as you eat.

If I had to judge, the pizza weighs in around 8-9 lbs. It takes almost an hour to cook, so I'd say to call it in if you're interested. Winners get their pictures on the wall and a gift certificate refund of $30.

The day of decision was a Saturday in October. I met Matt Cohen at the pizza place with one goal in mind: we were going to destroy the time record, which stood around 24 minutes. Matt's always had great success in speed and sprinting competitions whereas I do better in long distance challenges.

 

We would need to split the difference today. I pressed hard to finish my half around 11 minutes. Matt started off like a rocket but had still one piece left at the 12-13 minute mark. We divided the last piece (4.5/8 for me) and took the new record in 15m30s. To Matt's credit, the pizza was dense as hell and his volume skill is definitely improving.

Four hours later, it was time for supper. I met up with John Rivera and prepared to face another 16" stuffed crust challenge. Most competitive eaters don't know John yet, but he knows quite a few of you. He lives in Joshua Tree and found out about me after we traded Hogzilla burger records at the Route 62 Diner in Yucca Valley. Most recently, he set a pancake record at the IHOP in Rancho Mirage after nearly doubling the house best.

But this time we were going after pizza, not burgers. The 30 minute time limit didn't seem intimidating even though with food in my stomach this second go would be considerably harder. We ended up splitting this challenge right down the middle, with a win in 27 minutes. John finished his last bite a few moments before mine. 

Two wins over the same challenge in one day.. the owner of the place couldn't believe it, but he was happy to add two more sets of winners to his Wall of Fame.

At the end, my total was 8.5 pieces or just over one entire 16" deep dish. It's not clear to me that I could have finished the entire pie solo in 30 minutes, but it might be something to do one day. There's also a solo 12" deep dish challenge (no winners yet), but I don't think that will give me much trouble.

At least pizza always tastes good. This one tasted great, probably the most buttery and flavorful deep dish I've yet to sample. Rest assured the gift certificates won't sit around unused.

Pictures from Stadium Pizza - July 2011

As promised yesterday, here are some pictures from Stadium Pizza in Wildomar.

 

 

Dessert - Reese's PB Cup Pizza

Video: Me and Kevin at the Stadium

In July, at long last, Kevin Ross and I went after the Big League Challenge at Stadium Pizza in Wildomar, CA. There were no winners so we went in and blazed a trail for future food warriors.

What's in the Big League Challenge, you ask? It's 7 lbs of total food. An 18" pizza with seven toppings, 12 hot wings, a loaf of garlic bread, and a pitcher of soda. The place has one of those soda machines that lets you mix and match flavors. Despite the huge array of choices, we independently decided upon root beer.

Kevin began the challenge with great speed. For a second I thought he'd leave me in the dust, but we evened out and finished with similar times.

Of late I've been busy with video editing. Lots of it. My next relevant post will include some photos from the restaurant.

Something Different

The format of this blog takes on a very repetitve course. It's usually: "XYZ goes here, eats large item of food, shocks onlookers, leaves." That's the short version. My write-ups are much longer than that.

Some months back I thought about using slideshows to vary the content. After one slideshow, the concept was shelved. Maybe it seemed like a lot of work. In the interest of variety, the slideshow idea will be given new life.

In this post and the next, I will include slideshows highlighting all the food challenges completed in the first half of 2011. It might give the reader a better sense of what I eat on a month-to-month basis. My stream of consciousness usually jumps from one year to the next seamlessly. Most of my stories do not obey chronology so it's hard to gauge what's happening in reality.

The end of July will bring another slideshow, and there will be one video for every month to close out 2011 assuming I stay in this activity.

So, here are the video links.

January 2011



February 2011



March 2011



The videos for April, May, and June 2011 will debut in the next post.

It's a new step. Sometimes that's what you need most.

Big D's Pizza

Sometimes life is a series of random circumstances. A coworker looked up the website for a small pizza parlor in San Dimas and inadvertently discovered that they had an eating challenge.

My reputation for doing this stuff is not a secret. I called for details and learned that this challenge was as-of-yet undefeated. That added a bit of incentive. It was probably high-difficulty.


It's simple, really: eat one of their large 20x20 square pizzas in 45 minutes and it's free ($20-25 if you lose). Winners also get their name on a plaque and take home a free t-shirt. When I walked in Friday night, the plaque didn't exist yet.

Mathematically, a 20x20 square pizza works out to 400 square inches, or slightly bigger than a 22.5" round pizza. That's huge. Typically, solo pizza challenges don't run bigger than 18" or 20".

But surface area is one thing, and weight is another. I was told this was a 6-7 lb pizza (all depending on whom I asked in the restaurant), of which 4 lbs were just dough. Given my past experiences, I knew it would be close.

Breads and other starches aren't my friends. This pizza boasted a thick crust.


It needed several minutes to cool. 45 minutes would pass quickly, so I decided to go as fast as I could in the beginning.

Doughy.... chewy.... I worked my way around the entire crust to eliminate the largest, breadiest section of the pizza first. About 15-16 minutes in it was more than half gone.

Then, predictably, things slowed down. The staff was convinced at this point that I could be their first winner, but they didn't feel that way when I first showed up. Admissions didn't come til later.

But... it was still a haul. Every remaining piece was a tedious, dry-mouth fight. Lots of chewing. Lots of water. Tension.

My colleague encouraged me to finish the last few pieces while Devo's "Whip It" was still playing over the sound system, but it wasn't happening. The cheese was now like asphalt.

Still, I appreciated the 80s soundtrack that accompanied me through my food fight.


All clear at 42 minutes. And dehydrated. Lots of water would follow those 24 squares of pizza.

It was a fun evening all around. This challenge just needs a little more publicity... I'm sure they'll be getting more takers (and winners) in the near future. Definitely not for the faint-hearted. There were doubts swirling in my mind (and stomach) at the end.

The proof is in the pictures.

Big Rocco

Some pizzas are so massive they have their own life story. The 8 lb Big Rocco Stuffed Crust Pizza might have its own gravitational pull as well.

Maybe the truth is a little of both. On December 13, four of us were mystically pulled to Chicago Rocco's in San Diego to attempt this heretofore unconquered eating challenge.

As to the story, the owners told us that they named this pizza after their son - Rocco - who weighed 8 lbs at birth. I like that little detail. It really breathes some life into an otherwise standard pizza challenge. There's something neat, and equally perverse, about trying to eat the weight of a newborn in pizza.

If anyone is suspicious, 8 lbs is a standard marker for 2-person pizza challenges. Luigi's at the Beach (also in San Diego) claims that their 30" cheese pizza clocks in at 8 lbs. Original Grazianos, a chain that runs challenges at various Southern California locations, claims that their monster pizza runs 8-10 lbs.

Expecting one person to consume 8 lbs of pizza is no small feat. The pizza is only 12" wide, but it is 3" high and loaded with all the cheese you didn't ask for. It looks intimidating as they bring it out of the oven and set it on the table.

You get to pick six toppings (or stuffings?) from the menu. Picking lighter toppings will backfire, as it did with all of us, because they will add as much cheese and sauce as necessary to bring the total weight up to 8 lbs. Eat it all and it's free. Otherwise, pay them $35.

There's no time limit on this challenge. You get to take as long as you like. Of course, that's not always an advantage. Anyone who's ever tried to leisurely coast thru 7-8 lbs of food will find it gets increasingly painful as time wears on. It pays to "speed eat" sometimes.

Due to transportation issues, we arrived in two groups of two via different freeways. We agreed that the team arriving first might as well just begin the challenge. So, Manny Blitz and I dug in.

The pizzas were cut into 8 massive slices. The first 3-4 slices tasted delicious. Rich. Things got incredibly difficult once we passed the 50% point. I knew I would beat this thing, but it would be a battle. A long battle.

Our second team, composed of Aaron Ybarra and Stephanie Torres, arrived about 25 minutes after we had started. Soon enough, they were tearing through their own massive stuffed pizzas.


Though Manny and I started the challenge first, Aaron and Stephanie blasted through their pies with speedy technique. I hoped, somewhat legitimately, to become the first to finish this huge pizza. That honor instead went to Stephanie, who finished her pizza in approximately 36 minutes. The staff treated her to several sodas on the house after her big win.

I continued eating. It was considerably difficult because all the grease was getting to me... I don't think I ever needed to eat so much damn cheese in all my life. Along the way, Manny threw in the towel after eating about 6/8 of the total pie. He fought valiantly toward the end.

Pushing myself hard, I finished the last morsel of greasy pizza at 88 minutes. A win is a win! That makes me the second person to conquer the Big Rocco... considering the oily brutality of the challenge, it's an honor I should wear with pride. It really tested my endurance for distance eating. My only regret is not finishing within the hour mark I'd set for myself.


Strategy is all-important. Manny and I both employed a "slice by slice" method, but that was clearly not the way to go. You needed to get through the cheese before it hardened - and before your body began to reject all the grease. Our fellow eaters handled it the right way.

Though Aaron eventually gave up, he ate about 7/8 of the pie. No matter what else I can say, the man is fast! He's got a bright future in speed eating. The Big Rocco seems to be just a bit above his current stomach capacity.

It would have been cool to have gone 4 for 4 that night, but 2 for 4 is a decent result given the immense difficulty of the challenge. Most restaurant challenges do not approach the 8 lb mark, and for good reason.

It was a thrill to win, but the next day hardly felt glamorous ;(