Eating Contests Are Big Draw at San Gennaro Feast of the Hamptons

The San Gennaro Feast of the Hamptons has been one of the most highly anticipated events of the fall festival season for more than a decade. Like many other festivals in the area, San Gennaro offers a wide array of activities and fun for the whole family on the back-to-back days it takes over the streets of Hampton Bays.

But there is one area in particular where the San Gennaro Feast can confidently claim bragging rights over other festivals that compete for the attention of residents and visitors — the food.

Food lovers should circle September 23 and 24 on their calendar this year, for the 11th iteration of the festival that celebrates Italian heritage and culture. Vendors from across Long Island show up on the scene with all kinds of Italian delights for festivalgoers to enjoy. For those who approach eating like a competitive sport, the festival offers even more: a chance to showcase not only a love of food but a special talent for consuming it.

Dale and Heather Suter, the owners of Greenport Fire, a hot sauce shop based in Greenport, have been sponsoring and organizing the popular food eating contests at the San Gennaro Feast since its inception and will be back at it again this year.

Four separate food-eating contests — two on Saturday and two on Sunday — will be featured events at the festival. The contests are open to all ages, and there are cash prizes for the first-, second- and third-place winners.

Those who follow the adage “Life is uncertain; eat dessert first” will be happy to know that the food-eating contests kick off on Saturday, September 23, at 3:15 p.m. with the cannoli-eating contest, followed by the pizza-eating contest at 5:15 p.m.

On Sunday, the zeppoli-eating contest goes off at 2:15 p.m., and the grand finale — the meatball-eating contest — is set for 4 p.m.

The food vendors providing the cannolis, zeppolis and meatballs for the eating contests vary each year, while the pizza for the contest is always supplied by a hometown favorite, Scotto’s.

First-place winners in each contest earn $100, with second-place earning $50 and third-place earning $25. It’s all in the form of “feast bucks,” redeemable at the festival only.

Both Greenport Fire and Skidmore’s Sports provide “swag bags” to contestants.

The structure of the food-eating contests prioritizes speed over quantity, and has cut-off times to ensure no one ruins their day by inadvertently getting sick from overeating.

For the pizza-eating contest, the top prize goes to whoever can finish an entire pizza pie first (The goal for each contestant is to finish the entire pie in less than five minutes). For the cannoli contest, whoever can throw down a dozen first is the winner, and for the zeppoli contest, whoever finishes an entire bag first wins. If this last one sounds easy, Dale Suter points out that the powdered sugar liberally dusted on the zeppolis can provide an unexpected challenge when it comes to consuming them quickly.

In the meatball-eating contest, whoever finishes a dozen first wins, but there’s a twist: no hands allowed. It makes for a lot of fun and a lot of mess, Suter said.

Trying to structure the eating contests in a way that ensures no one gets ill was intentional, Suter added.

“We really don’t try to overdo anything,” he said. “Our hot sauce store has been involved in other food-eating contests that usually have to do with eating hot peppers and hot sauce. When you make people eat as much as they possibly can, it’s not usually a good result.”

Suter said that while the contestants vary each year, festivalgoers typically enjoy watching the eating contests, even if they are reluctant to compete. He said the youngest competitors usually put on a good show when it comes to giving the competitive element of eating their all.

“It’s fun because a lot of kids get involved,” he said. “It’s great watching the kids enjoy themselves. Every now and then we get someone older. Last year we had a guy in his 70s who did almost every competition.”

When it comes to strategy, Suter said some contestants have certain techniques that help maximize results.

“We hand out bottles of water and people get very creative with the water,” he said, calling to mind the epic hot dog eating contests on Coney Island when competitors dunk the dogs in a cup of water before eating them. “With the zeppolis, they dunk them in and continually drink water to make them go down.”

He said the contests are always fun spectator events because, while the format remains the same each year, what happens when the timer starts is always exciting and different.

“The kids are the ones who surprise you the most,” he added. “We had a 12-year-old who weighed all of about 90 pounds, and he polished off an entire pizza, and you’re just amazed that that’s doable. The kids are the best part of the competition because people really start cheering them on.

“That’s why we do it every year,” Suter concluded. “It brings a great turnout, and people love to watch it.”

Sourcing competitors for each contest isn’t an exact science or necessarily an easy task. Suter said he and other Greenport Fire employees will sometimes walk through the crowd trying to recruit enough people to get into the action.

For this year’s festival, anyone who has an interest in competing in any of the contests can email greenportfire@gmail.com and add “Attention Heather Suter” in the subject line.

Suter said no matter how many contestants show up, and what the outcome is, it’s clear that by now, the contests have become a staple feature of the San Gennaro Feast.

“Everybody that gets involved has the spirit of entering a competition and possibly winning,” he said. “And for people in the audience, it’s something they like watching, and maybe sometimes they would like to get involved but they just don’t. Sometimes they just like watching people make a fool of themselves.

“I think it goes really well with the whole concept of the feast,” he added. “We get a large turnout, and people can’t wait to see the contestants and how well they do. It seems to get bigger and bigger each year.”