Hilda Baci dethroned as Irish cook sets new longest cooking record

“That was just a rumour, records can be broken anytime”

Rejoice Okechukwu and Ebube Ibeh • November 7, 2023

Hilda Baci and Alan Fisher

Irish chef, Alan Fisher, has earned the Guinness World Record for the longest hours of nonstop cooking thereby dethroning Nigerian chef Hilda Bassey otherwise called Hilda Baci.

GWR announced on its X page that the Irish chef cooked for a total of 119 hours, and 57 minutes surpassing Hilda who cooked for 93 hours and 11 minutes.

Alan from Ireland owns a restaurant in Japan and has broken two cooking-related Guinness World Records titles. After claiming the longest cooking marathon (individual), he then set a new record for the longest individual baking marathon, clocking in at 47 hours and 21 minutes, surpassing the previous record held by Wendy Sandner (USA), who had baked for 31 hours and 16 minutes.

The GWR stated Alan tackled both challenges consecutively, which means he spent more than 160 hours in the kitchen, with just a little over a day of rest in between.

According to the GWR, “Alan learned about the longest cooking marathon record in March while he was participating in the “I Love Ireland” festival in Tokyo. During this festival, Alan stood inside a rented kitchen car and stayed overnight twice.”

Speaking with the GWR, the chef shared that he had hallucinations due to fatigue.

“As fatigue started to take hold I would find it more and more difficult to stay awake whenever I sat down to start peeling. The rhythm of the peeling would almost hypnotise me. I had one hallucination on the second-to-last day. I turned to ask someone to pass me something like I would on any normal day only to realise there was no one there,” he said.

After Hilda won the record, words spread that it takes a year for a record to be broken after someone already won. However, after the announcement of the recent record-breaking, an X user Philip asked the GWR about the rules of not applying after a year and they replied thus, “That was just a rumour, records can be broken anytime!”

Reacting to the feat, Baci on Tuesday took to her official page to congratulate the new record holder.

She wrote, “Huge congratulations to Alan Fisher! 119hrs 57mins is a huge achievement, and I wish him all the best as the new world record holder.’’

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