It's perhaps the highlight of the township's summer recreation program.
The annual pie eating and watermelon eating contests were held Wednesday and Thursday night last week, on consecutive nights because of the torrential downpour that had postponed the watermelon chomping bonanza for one week.
So on Wednesday night, the kids of Weehawken were treated to pie. On Thursday, it was the juicy, wet melons. It was a regular dessert smorgasbord, courtesy of Weehawken Recreation.
Eleven-year-old Tessie Urtubia was more than prepared for both contests. After watching her little brother, Gil, win a trophy in last year's pie eating bash, Tessie was determined to get her own - er, pardon the pun - piece of the pie this year.
"It wanted me to do it this year," Tessie Urtubia said. "I was ready for it. I ate a little bit each day, but not a lot, just to be sure that I could do it."
Sure enough, young Tessie was not only able to compete in both contests, but she came away with a trophy in both, easily winning her respective age group (ages 9-12).
Of course, there were obstacles, like picking the right flavor pie.
"I had to pick blueberry, because I don't like apple pie and I hate pineapple," Urtubia said.
Pineapple? In a pie-eating contest? Sure, perhaps in Honolulu, but not Weehawken.
"We wanted to have an assortment of different pies," Weehawken Recreation Director Chuck Barone said.
"Some of the kids were given choices, but most of them really didn't care. To most of them, they just wanted to get messy."
But not the Weehawken queen of eating. Besides, would she want to be known as "Messy Tessie?"
"I didn't like getting it all over my face," Urtubia said. "One of the blueberries went up my nose. That didn't feel comforting at all."
It's safe to say that blueberries up the nose are never comforting.
What a melon As for the watermelon a day later, young Tessie was all business again.
"I'd have to say that they were both equally hard," Urtubia said. "The pie was huge, but the watermelon was even more huge. I could barely bite it."
Now, there's the old wives' tale about eating watermelon, that if you swallow the pits, something might happen. "Yeah, like I might grow a tree in my stomach or something," Urtubia said. "But I wasn't worried about that."
The object of the watermelon contest was simple. Each child is giving a heapin' helping of watermelon, a slice as big as their face. The toddlers are supposed to eat the watermelon right down to the rind, and they're allowed to use their hands. But the older kids, ages 7 and up, have to keep their hands behind their backs and only use their mouths to gobble.
"The little kids are especially funny, because the rinds are bigger than their smiles," Barone said. "We let the little kids hold the ends with their decent size piece, but the older kids get no help."
Speed is of the essence in these contests, of course, so there is little concern at all with the one obstacle that a watermelon contest could present - namely the pits.
"They swallow everything," Barone said. "We leave it up to them. They really do whatever they want."
In the pie eating contest, there are simple rules - no use of utensils or even hands. It's all face, all pie.
"The kids really like to get all messed up," Barone said. "That's just as much fun as the contest itself. You see the kids with the messy faces and everyone is cheering for each other. It really is a lot of fun."
Just ask the eating queen.
"It's a good feeling to win and that I was able to win," Tessie Urtubia said. "I was kind of surprised that I was able to win."
"We had a great turnout, even with the rainout the week before," Barone said. "It's one of the biggest turnouts we've ever had for these contests and this is definitely one of the more popular ones. This contest has been around forever, way before I even took over [as director 16 years ago]. Pie eating and watermelon eating are our two summer standards. Everyone has a blast."
But wait! There's more... Now, the pizza eating contest looms this Wednesday. Maybe Urtubia can make it a clean sweep.
Or maybe not.
"I was kind of full after these two," she said.
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