50 years ago today, a man named Donald Gorske ate a McDonald’s Big Mac for the first time.
But not the last: he’s eaten over 30,000 of them.
And yes, he holds the world record for most Big Macs eaten by a single person.
Gorske says there’s nothing fancy about why he’s pursued this goal for years and years.
In a way, it wasn’t even really a goal.
He says he eats Big Macs several times a day because he really likes Big Macs.
He calls them the perfect food.
He’s eaten them at football games, baseball games, NASCAR races, pretty much every place you can think of.
It’s easier to do when your favorite food is available most everywhere, though there has been at least one day Gorske was traveling and couldn’t find a single Big Mac even after driving hundreds of miles.
Fast food isn’t known for being health food; even McDonald’s advises people to occasionally eat other things.
But Gorske says the big dose of Big Macs hasn’t affected his health.
Though he does sometimes order a fruit and yogurt parfait to get a few more fruits into his diet.
He’s been featured on TV and in documentaries, and he wrote and published a memoir about his life in food, called 22,477 Big Macs.
Needless to say the number is a lot higher now.
Scientists at the University of Florida just got edible plants to grow in rock and dust taken from the moon about half a century ago.
The plants grew from seeds, more or less normally, and they appear to be safe to eat, though the growing process was tricky.
At first, as the Washington Post reported, the lunar samples “repelled water as if it were the most disgusting thing ever invented.”
This American Hero Ate 30,000 Big Macs and Survived (VICE)
Plants grow in lunar soil brought to Earth by Apollo astronauts (Washington Post)