By Rachel Belle

photo courtesy of Lisa “The Leez” Wright

Listen to Matzoh Ball Eating Contest!

Professional eating is a strange sport. That’s right, I said sport! Americans seem to be equally disgusted and fascinated with competitive eating…including myself. So when I saw that JConnect was holding a matzoh ball eating competition in Seattle, I signed myself up.

Upon arriving I met my competition. Robert Bizer competed last year, and ended up throwing up mid-competition.

“I got sick, I did quite poorly. I made it through about 1.6 pounds and then had to recuse myself. The person who won last year ate three pounds, which is roughly 40 matzoh balls, in about three and a half minutes.”

Richard Shea, president of Major League Eating, the biggest competitive eating group in the country, gave me some strategic advice.

“It’s largely a mental game. Sure you need hand speed, sure you need stomach capacity, sure you need jaw strength; but about midway through the contest you really need to mentally handle the challenge.”

In last year’s matzoh ball eat off, Devin Konick took down about 22 broth soaked orbs.

“I felt very full and I felt like I had a matzoh ball stuck in my throat for the rest of the day. It was not comfortable.”

Richard says there is a theory that skinny people are better competitive eaters.

“The Belt of Fat Theory, which is a scientific or academic piece, about adipose tissue tissue. If it presses against your stomach it prohibits expansion. That’s well regarded amongst most competitive eaters.”

Last night eight of us sat down to a plate of 15 matzoh balls. If you finished that plate, another was brought in it’s place. My two goals were not to barf or choke, so I took bites, as others crammed whole matzoh balls into their mouths.

In the end, Devin had the win with 20 matzoh balls in 5 minutes! I tied for 4th place, eating 12 matzoh balls in five minutes, and I wanted to know how I ranked in the eyes of Mr Food competition.

“This was your first competitive eating event? That’s very impressive, I think. We’re doing a Nathan’s Famous female round; you could get into the game and win. That’s an impressive finish for the first time.”

Woo hoo! Not a bad idea, considering the Nathan’s female hot dog competition winner will take home a $20 thousand purse. The world champion makes $200,000 a year shoving food down his gullet.

“Joey Chestnut, a competitive eater out of San Jose, CA, has the record of eating 68 Nathan’s hot dogs and buns in 10 minutes and he has won the contest 4 years in a row.”

This could be my new calling! 12 matzoh balls in 5 minutes and I still had room to eat salad, gefilte fish and cake afterwards.

Burrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrp.