The winner was was a Dungeon & Dragons podcaster in his early 30s from Greenpoint. Nobody else stood a chance.
What makes a local culture? What are the rituals and routines, collected over the years, that become part of the indelibly shared fabric of neighborhood life? Perhaps, if Sarah Khoshaba has her way, watching the few and the brave eating enormous sandwiches the size of shrunken human heads will become something of a tradition on this corner of Ridgewood, where Khoshaba has been operating a quietly popular sandwich cafe called Gunther’s for the past year. And a successful one too; smashed tenderly and padded between two eggshell-shaped brioche buns, the burgers there easily register as some of the best in Ridgewood since the pandemic-era departure of Onderdonk and Sons.
But it was one of the first warm Saturday afternoons of the summer and the fifty or so people, largely locals, dressed to the nines in their weekend Brain Dead and Big Bud apparel, had gathered outside Gunther’s to watch other people eat. Corralled around a few tables were some nine of them, arranged not unlike guests at Leonardo’s last supper. In front of each were miniature skyscrapers of sourdough, specially made, slices stacked between mounds of deli meat and sliced cheese. Most of the contestants who signed up were proud, somewhat new locals, like Nate “vrunt” Lamagna, who once told a local Instagram page, “I moved to Ridgewood in 2019 and I’ve never thought about living in any other neighborhood since. This is the perfect place to be.”
It was the beginning of a new tradition, says Khoshaba, whose business had taken over the spot run by the ill-fated Cafe Moca, which had the misfortune of opening in late 2019. As it happened, the idea of Gunther’s had been a creation of the pandemic itself, starting out as a soup-selling concern Khoshaba ran out of her apartment and her instagram page during lockdown, under the moniker “Soup Queen BK.” She later turned this into a pop-up, menu expanded beyond soups and now named after her dog and operating, for some time, out of the Farewell Bar on Troutman Street, though she left after that bar closed down. (The place has since been reopened as Keybar, whose operators used to run a bar of the same name in the East Village.)
Khoshaba’s sandwich eating contest had attracted a handful of like-minded, hipster creations of late pandemic culture, from a weed-delivery outfit run by Dwight Kenneth called “Baked In Bushwick,” who handed out free joints, to “Loose Change,” a company that sells bottles of remarkably pungent juice, an idea that Casey Campbell told me he started with his girlfriend when it had been hard to find assistant directing work during the writer’s strike last year.
“Now, sometimes, directors will keep me on set just to get some of the juice,” Campbell tells me. He was using the event to give out small bottles of these things, which come in flavors green and another one called “Healthy Boy,” a deeply orange concoction of carrots, tangerines, red peppers, lemon juice and ginger that promises to improve “brain function in children with ADHD symptoms” and “helps prevent cancer.” He tells me that he started out selling them outside his yoga studio in Williamsburg.
“I really find that approaching things like this strategically makes it really fun to do,” Eric Silver told me. He had been the eating contest’s winner, by a mile. The bearded podcaster and professional gamemaster told me he had arrived with some experience from hitting up the city’s occasional dumpling eating contests, along with studying the likes of Joey Chestnut. The way Silver dipped his slices of sourdough into the cups filled with water from the ostentatious seltzer brand Liquid Death had been performed with a kind of noticeable grace and commendable awe. Toward the contest’s end, he would wave around the remaining slices of bread and cheese victoriously. His wife and sister had both shown up to provide moral support and the group tells me they’re in Ridgewood all the time. Gunther’s. Aunt Ginny’s, Windjammer, and the like.
“I’ve been here for ten years,” his sister tells me. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Gunther’s is located at 487 Seneca Avenue. Keep up with its hours and menu on Instagram.
Photos taken by Andrew Karpan.
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