It doesn’t get much more adventurous than this.
The Sault’s Jade Bryant and Echo Bay’s Jeremy Wheten are probably still feeling full after completing the daunting “Stackburger Challenge” this past Wednesday.
The two friends each managed to consume their own 14-patty cheeseburgers at the downtown eatery within 90 minutes, defeating the previous record held by an out-of-towner at 13 patties.
“At first, it didn’t seem that bad or look that big,” Wheten told SooToday. “But as soon as I started diving into it, I knew it was going to be difficult.”
Having never participated in a food challenge before, Bryant and Wheten agreed last minute to go for the record, but only on the condition that they both finished.
“We wanted to do it together,” Bryant said. “But if one of us couldn’t finish their burger, then we weren’t going to finish at all. We wanted to share the record together.”
“We didn’t even prepare for it; we sort of jumped right in,” Wheten laughed. “But I’m really glad I did it with Jade. It was nice we were able to support each other through the whole thing.”
Livestreaming their experience on Facebook, Bryant felt confident in his burger eating abilities from the jump and got off to a quick start.
Then, a chewy reality began to set in.
“I got four patties down in less than seven minutes, so I had high hopes,” Bryant said. “But it took about 20 minutes to get the next three patties down, and the rest of the burger took almost 40 minutes. I thought it wouldn’t be challenging, but it was.”
“It’s not the quantity of food that was difficult – it was the cheese and grease,” he added. “The last few patties were pretty rough, and the very last bite was hard to get down.”
Thirty minutes after his friend finished, Wheten took his final bite to clinch the shared record.
“I felt relieved that I could actually finish all of that, because I didn’t think I’d be able to at first,” Wheten said. “It was a crazy experience.”
To recognize their success, Stackburger gave each of them a free t-shirt and shared a congratulatory post on social media, which has received hundreds of reactions and comments over the last three days.
The two even earned the right to rename the burger, which will now be known as the "Jade and Jeremy Duo Burger."
Will the record stand? The two friends have differing views.
“I’m not sure if anyone can beat this record, but I do encourage it,” Bryant said. “I’m not a competitive food eater by any means, but when it comes to food, that was very close to my personal limit – and I don’t really have a limit.”
“I don’t think the record will hold for a long time,” Wheten added. “Some of the comments were saying that someone already wanted to go and beat the record, so it probably won’t be too long.”
Riding the high on a successful outing, Bryant and Wheten would be open to attempting more food challenges down the road, but they’d like to see more local restaurants offer them.
“I don’t think Sault Ste. Marie has a lot of food challenges around here to begin with,” Bryant admitted. “If we had more, I would definitely take them on.”
“I think the Sault could really benefit from that,” Wheten added. “A lot of people would have really fun with that, and I think it’d bring everyone together. We need more food eating challenges for sure.”
