What To Eat At Fifth Third Ballpark

Talking about the food at Fifth Third Ballpark without mentioning the Fifth Third Burger would be like explaining the history of baseball without including Ty Cobb and Babe Ruth. This monstrous burger has been featured on Travel Channel’s Man v. Food and is legendary among ballpark eats.

The burger costs $20 and is made up of an eight-inch diameter bun weighing one pound, five one-third pound patties, a cup of chili, five slices of American cheese, salsa, Fritos, lettuce, tomatoes, sour cream and nacho cheese sauce. The vital stats? A mere 4,889 calories, 119.2 grams of saturated fat, 744.6 grams of cholesterol and 10,887.9 milligrams of sodium. Fortunately, this burger comes in at less than 300 grams of total fat — 299.5, to be exact. To take part in this burger’s eating challenge, you must sit in a designated competition area at the end of the third base concourse under the watchful eye of a referee. If you can eat the monstrosity by the game’s final out, you get a T-shirt celebrating the accomplishment. The team has a specific set of rules for the contest, including, “Burger reversals result in disqualification.” If you aren’t interested in attempting the feat, make sure to check out the competition area to see if other fans are partaking.

Of course, this isn’t your only food option during your visit to Fifth Third Ballpark. Concession stands at the park sell pretty much what you’d expect to find at any ballpark, as well as some less-common items such as cheese bread sticks, steak and chicken sandwiches, gluten-free beer and even fried peanut butter and jam sandwiches.

New for the 2012 season, the Whitecaps are offering a number of unique concession items, headlined by the Westside Po’ Boy sandwich. The sandwich is a hoagie roll stuffed with kielbasa, pierogies and sauerkraut, and the whole thing is doused in marinara sauce. This filling treat is available at the Streak Cart concession behind home plate. Other new items include a 1.5-pound smoked turkey leg, deep-fried pierogies, deep-fried pickle slices, gluten-free hot dogs and more. On the suite level, new items include deviled eggs, a half rack of smoked ribs and even a lobster roll.

The main concession stand, located directly behind home plate, sells the widest variety of items; other stands around the concourse sell fewer items. If you like numbers, you might be interested to know that 30,000 gallons of soft drinks are served each season at Fifth Third Ballpark and if you placed all the hot dogs sold each year end to end, they’d run for 14 miles. If anyone ever asks you the answers to these questions, now you know.

If you’re thirsty, be sure to check out the Tiki Hut concession stand on the third base side. You won’t be able to miss its Hawaii-themed decor, but beyond the visual appeal, this stand sells a variety of alcoholic beverages, alcohol and non-alcohol fruit smoothies and even iced coffee.

Fans who have a sweet tooth will enjoy any of the park’s several desserts, including ice cream, frozen lemonade, root beer floats, elephant ears and a variety of common sweet treats.