Sep 15, 2005 By Jennifer Harr 3 min read

It’s 5 feet long, 10 inches wide, and has eight pounds of meat, two cheeses and enough lettuce and tomato that Jeremy Critchfield, the executive chef for Nemacolin Woodlands Resort & Spa, jokes it could be considered a salad. “It” is the Dagwood sandwich, the newest creation that will be offered at concession stands during the PGA Tour’s 84 Lumber Classic.

The engineering department at the posh resort, which plays host to the PGA tournament for the third year, designed a six-foot long carrying board to transport the massive sandwich, said executive chef Jeremy Critchfield.

With super-long picks in place to hold the monstrosity together, Critchfield said that guests will come through concessions set up on the course to request a slice – and they might not need anything else to eat. One slice is 10 inches by 4 inches by 7 inches, he said.

“It’s pretty much a meal in itself,” he said.

Critchfield and his team of staff and volunteers have been hard at work planning for this year’s tourney since two weeks after last year’s ended.

“As much work as there is, especially with the culinary team, the planning process has gone much smoother this year. We’ve taken good notes and learned from the past,” he said.

The planning committee met bi-weekly for seven months and then weekly since then, Critchfield said.

“It’s a yearlong process – 100 percent,” Critchfield said.

From a concessions standpoint, Critchfield said he again expects to see an increase in patrons, up from last year’s 165,000 spectators served to 220,000 this year. And he’ll do it with an army of about 450 staff and volunteers.

“It’s 450 versus 220,000. It doesn’t seem quite fair, but the 220,000 aren’t going to know what hit them. We’re going to take care of them,” he said.

The resort’s food service company will be making frequent deliveries during the week to keep the provisions coming. Around 20, 48-foot long tractor-trailers will make deliveries to Nemacolin during the week, Critchfield said.

“We’re definitely planning to be much busier,” he said.

With two years of history upon which to base food purchasing, Critchfield said he is hopeful that he’ll have a pretty good idea of what’s needed, but he still called the initial order “a pretty wild guess.” Daily, he’ll place orders for additional food to make certain the tourney runs smoothly – and deliciously – throughout the week.

Critchfield said this year, in anticipation of heavier crowds, he’s expecting to go through 25,000 pounds of potatoes in making the fresh cut French fries that have pleased crowds in the past years. That’s up from the 15,000 pounds Critchfield estimated he would use last year.

“We’re definitely ready for the masses,” he said.

To accommodate the growing tournament crowds, Critchfield said additional concession sites have been added to the course. New skyboxes and members clubs will also feature culinary creations. In total, concessions on the golf course have expanded by 25 percent, he said.

Nemacolin’s total offering of on-course food makes the resort unique, Critchfield said, because there is only one other PGA tournament host site that did that this year.

An estimated 450 people, including volunteers, will handle the food end of things for the entire tournament.

Critchfield said the culinary staff now partners with five culinary schools and two vocational technical schools. Greene and Indiana county vo-tech schools are loaning their culinary students to the tournament, he said.

Students will work two eight-hour shifts, and will make up about 130 of the tournaments 450 food-related volunteers, Critchfield said.

“It’s pretty amazing, the support the schools have shown us,” he said.