# What is the most amount of calories ever eaten in one sitting by a human
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [December 6, 2018, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652 "2018-12-06T03:32:32Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/1 "2018-12-06T03:32:32Z")
I’m watching Matt Stonie and his competitive eating challenge videos on youtube. They are interesting but he usually limits his intake during his youtube challenges to around 10,000 calories.
For the hot dog eating competition, the people who consume 60-70 hot dogs are eating around 20,000 calories.
Granted, most of these people just vomit it up after the competition. They never actually digest them.
But is there a world record for the most calories eaten in one sitting?
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### Author:  [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/2 "2018-12-06T03:48:16Z")
I couldn’t find this on the actual Guinness site, but I found this on another site that claimed it was from the Guinness Book of World Records:
> [@](#):
>
> According to the record book, in 1985 the medical journal The Lancet published a story about the largest meal eaten in modern history. Eaten by a 23-year-old woman, the meal was made up of one pound of liver, two pounds of kidneys, eight ounces of steak, two eggs, one pound of cheese, two large slices of bread, one pound of mushrooms, two pounds of carrots, one cauliflower, 10 peaches, four pears, two apples, four bananas, two pounds of plums, two pounds of grapes, and two glasses of milk, reaching 16 pounds in total.
>
> The woman “later died following attempts to have the undigested food surgically removed,” the journal noted.
No calorie count was given.
There is also this:
> [@](#):
>
> Fastest Weight Gained
>
> This moronic record currently belongs to Donna Simpson, of New Jersey, USA. She weighed 602 pounds (273.5 kg) in 2010, when she set up a website where people could pay money to watch her eat junk food. She determined to break the record for world’s heaviest woman within 2 years, and proceeded to eat 20,000 calories a day while moving as little as possible. Her 2010 Christmas dinner alone was 30,000 calories and consisted on 2 whole turkeys, 2 hams, a roast, and over 30 pounds of vegetables. She was aiming for a weight of 1,000 lbs, and her weekly grocery bills ranged from $580 to $750.
>
> She has given up the record as of 2011 (probably for financial reasons), and gone on a diet so she won’t die before raising her children. There is no need to explain why breaking her record is a bad idea.
> **[10 Dangerously Stupid World Records - Listverse](https://listverse.com/2012/12/07/10-ridiculously-stupid-world-records/)**
>
> World records inspire us to strive harder, and make something more of ourselves. But in the last several years, they have degenerated into freak shows -
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### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/3 "2018-12-06T03:51:15Z")
Diamond Jim Brady has to be in the running. Per Wiki:
_For breakfast, he would eat “vast quantities of hominy, eggs, cornbread, muffins, flapjacks, chops, fried potatoes, beefsteak, washing it all down with a gallon of fresh orange juice”. A mid-morning snack would consist of “two or three dozen clams or Lynnhaven oysters”. Luncheon would consist of “shellfish…two or three deviled crabs, a brace of boiled lobsters, a joint of beef, and an enormous salad”. He would also include a dessert of “several pieces of homemade pie” and more orange juice. Brady would take afternoon tea, which consisted of “another platter of seafood, accompanied by two or three bottles of lemon soda”. Dinner was the main meal of the day, taken at Rector’s Restaurant. It usually comprised “two or three dozens oysters, six crabs, and two bowls of green turtle soup. Then in sumptuous procession came six or seven lobsters, two canvasback ducks, a double portion of terrapin, sirloin steak, vegetables, and for dessert a platter of French pastries.” Brady would even include two pounds of chocolate candy to finish off the meal._
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### Author:  [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/4 "2018-12-06T04:29:51Z")
There is also Tarrere, but who knows how much of it is true vs folklore. No idea what disease he had, but his skin being hot to the touch makes me wonder if he had an overactive thyroid (among other things).
> **[Tarrare: A Terrifying True Scary Story - Designing Life](https://designinglife.biz/tarrare-terrifying-scary-story/)**
>
> Tarrare is a terrifying scary story of a man whose hunger is so big he ate bodies from the morgue... It's mysterious, unexplained and all true. Scary stuff
> [@](#):
>
> The military rations were unable to satisfy him. So, he took matters into his own hands and ate anything he could find from the gutters. His hunger grew so bad he eventually collapsed due to exhaustion and dehydration. At the hospital, they experimented on him. They allowed him to eat anything. He ate a meal intended for 15 people in a single sitting. Eating live cats, snakes, lizards and puppies at times… He also swallowed whole eels without chewing.
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### Author:  [@snfaulkner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snfaulkner)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/5 "2018-12-06T04:48:08Z")
How many lobsters in a brace of boiled lobsters? 3? Also, a joint of beef?
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### Author:  [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/6 "2018-12-06T05:16:10Z")
> [@snfaulkner](#):
>
> How many lobsters in a brace of boiled lobsters? 3?
A brace is a pair of something, usually animals killed in hunting.
> [@](#):
>
> Also, a joint of beef?
A joint is a large piece of meat cooked in one piece, usually containing a bone.
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### Author:  [@snfaulkner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snfaulkner)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/7 "2018-12-06T05:25:34Z")
Ignorance fought. Thanks!
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### Author:  [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/8 "2018-12-06T05:56:13Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#):
>
> There is also Tarrere, but who knows how much of it is true vs folklore. No idea what disease he had, but his skin being hot to the touch makes me wonder if he had an overactive thyroid (among other things).
>
> [Tarrare: A Terrifying True Scary Story - Designing Life](https://designinglife.biz/tarrare-terrifying-scary-story/)
I suspect that a lot of this is urban legend, but the insatiable appetite “slow mentality” also makes me wonder if he had Prader-Willi syndrome. No wonder he had chronic diarrhea, if he was also eating garbage out of the gutter.
> **[Prader-Willi syndrome - Symptoms and causes](https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/prader-willi-syndrome/symptoms-causes/syc-20355997)**
>
> This rare genetic condition leads to physical, mental and behavioral problems, including being hungry all the time.
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### Author:  [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/9 "2018-12-06T13:38:27Z")
All this posting [makes me hungry](https://www.delish.com/food-news/g22606587/highest-calorie-fast-food-restaurant-meals/).
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### Author:  [@Treppenwitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Treppenwitz)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/10 "2018-12-06T14:16:49Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#):
>
> I couldn’t find this on the actual Guinness site, but I found this on another site that claimed it was from the Guinness Book of World Records
For what it’s worth…I’m always deeply suspicious of this sort of thing, but a bit of googling gives April 85 as publication date in The Lancet; and you can find The Lancet 1985 TOC online, so you can find author and title, and from that an abstract. Not at all amusing, but it seems to be true, and here it is.
[http://agris.fao.org/agris-search/search.do?recordID=US201301446709](http://agris.fao.org/agris-search/search.do?recordID=US201301446709)
Note that it’s a letter to the editor, so it isn’t peer reviewed.
j
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### Author:  [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/11 "2018-12-06T14:24:23Z")
Point of Order: If the woman died because of the UNDIGESTED meal, can she really be given credit for having eaten it?
It’s like the NFL, you have to demonstrate “control” to be given credit for a “catch”. She didn’t demonstrate “control” of the food through the entire digestive process, so I’m ruling, “Record denied!”
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### Author:  [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/12 "2018-12-06T22:39:42Z")
> [@silenus](#):
>
> Diamond Jim Brady has to be in the running. Per Wiki:
>
> _For breakfast, he would eat “vast quantities of hominy, eggs, cornbread, muffins, flapjacks, chops, fried potatoes, beefsteak, washing it all down with a gallon of fresh orange juice”. A mid-morning snack would consist of “two or three dozen clams or Lynnhaven oysters”. Luncheon would consist of “shellfish…two or three deviled crabs, a brace of boiled lobsters, a joint of beef, and an enormous salad”. He would also include a dessert of “several pieces of homemade pie” and more orange juice. Brady would take afternoon tea, which consisted of “another platter of seafood, accompanied by two or three bottles of lemon soda”. Dinner was the main meal of the day, taken at Rector’s Restaurant. It usually comprised “two or three dozens oysters, six crabs, and two bowls of green turtle soup. Then in sumptuous procession came six or seven lobsters, two canvasback ducks, a double portion of terrapin, sirloin steak, vegetables, and for dessert a platter of French pastries.” Brady would even include two pounds of chocolate candy to finish off the meal._
[Urban legend](https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/31/dining/31diam.html).
> [@](#):
>
> Looking into the matter, I found that the various descriptions of Brady’s epic consumption had a common source: a biography by Parker Morell called “Diamond Jim: The Life and Times of James Buchanan Brady,” published in 1934, 17 years after its subject’s death.
>
> Here we find the original breakfast roll-call (“beefsteak, a few chops, eggs, flapjacks, fried potatoes, hominy”), the prolonged multispecies banquets (“terrapin, oysters, crabs, lobsters, shrimp, or frog’s legs,” followed by “saddles of lamb, veal mutton, venison, or antelope; or else turkey, goose, or capon”), and a shore dinner where Brady ate “everything that was set before him — to the sixth and seventh helping.” (Hence the recurring “six or seven lobsters” motif in Brady literature.)
>
> But orgiastic as these repasts are, they take place at different times; Morell does not conflate them into one single, purportedly typical day in Brady’s life. Aha! The first chink in the blubber!
Morrell told other tall tales in his book. Brady was a notorious eater in a time when gigantic dinners were common, but not an eating machine.
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### Author:  [@penultima\_thule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/penultima_thule)
#### Post date: [December 6, 2018, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/13 "2018-12-06T23:58:34Z")
> [@silenus](#):
>
> washing it all down with a gallon of fresh orange juice.
On a point of order, the gluttony cited is obscene but most of these examples relate to volumes of food consumed. A substantial portion of these meals is water. The OP question was calorie intake.
A bit over a litre of olive oil has 10,000 calories.
If you were to “wash down” with a (Imp) gallon of edible oil alone you’d have consumed 45,000 calories and probably on a gurney somewhere leaking calories from every pore and orifice.
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### Author:  [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2018, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/14 "2018-12-07T12:43:51Z")
I had heard that the Guinness Book people stopped keeping records of people eating dangerous amounts of food just to set a world’s record, and changed it to “most food consumed in x minutes.” Am I mistaken?
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### Author:  [@peedin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peedin)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2018, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/15 "2018-12-07T20:53:01Z")
Being a medical liberrian, I ordered the Lancet article via interlibrary loan. I will summarize after I read it.
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### Author:  [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Springtime_for_Spacers)
#### Post date: [December 8, 2018, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/16 "2018-12-08T00:18:25Z")
> [@peedin](#):
>
> Being a medical liberrian, I ordered the Lancet article via interlibrary loan. I will summarize after I read it.
Before you do I’ll just say that I remember this case in the news (certain details like the whole cauliflower stuck in my mind). The unfortunate woman was a “recovered” anorexic. As the summary says she alternated starving and binging. Irrc she was staying at her parents, came downstairs in the middle of the night and consumed the contents of the fridge, again irrc uncooked. Her mother was heartbroken.
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### Author:  [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)
#### Post date: [December 8, 2018, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/17 "2018-12-08T01:20:19Z")
> [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](#):
>
> Before you do I’ll just say that I remember this case in the news (certain details like the whole cauliflower stuck in my mind). The unfortunate woman was a “recovered” anorexic. As the summary says she alternated starving and binging. Irrc she was staying at her parents, came downstairs in the middle of the night and consumed the contents of the fridge, again irrc uncooked. Her mother was heartbroken.
Well. The letter in question, written by one Gillian M. Edwards of Royal Liverpool Hospital, goes into more detail than you would expect if it were an urban legend.
The medical history says that she had been “excessively concerned about her weight for several years” and was prescribed anabolic steroids 3 years previously, when she weighed 38.4 kg, but that there was no psychiatric referral nor had anorexia nervosa ever been diagnosed.
It does say that she had been interspersing 3-4-day periods of complete starvation with bouts of gorging, and describes the fatal 19-lb. meal. Stomach and rectal tubes failed to relieve the pressure, so they had to operate. They removed 3 litres of semisolid food from the stomach, but she died an hour after surgery. Her stomach and guts were not in good shape; main cause of death was septicaemia.
He notes that there are some comparisons with this case and “pig-bel”, which is an often fatal type of food poisoning brought on by the ceremonial eating in New Guinea of unaccustomed large quantities of partially uncooked pork.
He hopes that bulimia nervosa should be recognized and treated early, to avoid such medical emergencies.
[It is not a big surprise that eating too much food can be fatal, just as drinking too much water can be fatal.]
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### Author:  [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)
#### Post date: [December 8, 2018, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/18 "2018-12-08T01:23:04Z")
> [@Horatio\_Hellpop](#):
>
> I had heard that the Guinness Book people stopped keeping records of people eating dangerous amounts of food just to set a world’s record, and changed it to “most food consumed in x minutes.” Am I mistaken?
That was changed before the Guinness Book looked like a splashy junior high yearbook, and AFAIK they don’t accept records for alcoholic beverages any more either.
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### Author:  [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)
#### Post date: [December 8, 2018, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/19 "2018-12-08T01:29:59Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#):
>
> AFAIK they don’t accept records for alcoholic beverages any more either.
Not surprising. People often do not survive those vodka-drinking contests.
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### Author:  [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2018, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-amount-of-calories-ever-eaten-in-one-sitting-by-a-human/825652/20 "2018-12-09T04:38:26Z")
> [@penultima\_thule](#):
>
> On a point of order, the gluttony cited is obscene but most of these examples relate to volumes of food consumed. A substantial portion of these meals is water. The OP question was calorie intake.
>
> A bit over a litre of olive oil has 10,000 calories.
> If you were to “wash down” with a (Imp) gallon of edible oil alone you’d have consumed 45,000 calories and probably on a gurney somewhere leaking calories from every pore and orifice.
I think the answer to the OP has to look something like this. The limit to eating is the volume, so choosing a food with high calories per volume is essential. Fats or oils appear to be the best possible choice. As to digestion, the question isn’t about digestion, it’s about eating; besides, animals don’t normally absorb all the calories in food anyway, or else dung wouldn’t be combustable. It might be that a gallon or two of oil pass through without a great deal of change. Note the OP didn’t ask about the most amount of calories enjoyed.
There is, though, another possibility. People so morbidly obese that they are unable to move from bed, who keep eating for months or years this way, could be said to be consuming all that food in “one sitting”. We might need a judge’s ruling about whether that counts.
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