In 2011, writer Jon Hendren bet Steve Harwell $20 that he couldn’t eat 24 eggs at one time. Hendren’s online followers quickly started matching the bet. Harwell finally stipulated that if the fans could raise $10,000 for St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital, he’d accept the challenge. In only a few days the money was raised and the egg-off was on.
On October 10th, 2011, in Dublin California, Harwell sat down to eat the eggs cooked by none other than his friend, Guy Fieri. Fieri brought an assortment of eggs that included quail and duck. The task was made even more difficult because the scrambled eggs contained a Fieriesque helping of heat from Tabasco sauce and jalapeno peppers. Harwell offered $1,000 to St. Jude’s (with Fieri matching) for help from an audience member in finishing the eggs. The man who stepped up said he was donating to the charity event in honor of his daughter, whom he had recently lost. Harwell himself had lost his 6-month-old son Presley to leukemia in 2001, and this emotional news was the exclamation mark to an event that came together because of two close friends.
Harwell and Fieri’s bond was born through a love of food and music — two collaborative arts that provide sustenance and joy. Fieri mourned his friend on Instagram with the message, “To my brutha Steve. RIP. Today is a sad day, I will miss my friend.”
