The Last Dog Days of Summer
It’s almost impossible to enjoy summer without, at some point, a hot dog in your hand. You know… a dog, burger, and potato or macaroni salad just make the day. As we head into the fall season, I thought it a good idea to fire up the grill and enjoy one last “dog.” With further investigation, I found out that long before backyard grills, carnivals, and baseball games, ancient civilizations were already making early versions of “sausage.” And the idea was practical – use every part of the animal, preserve it with salt, and make it portable. What started as survival food slowly became something more refined as it moved across cultures and centuries. I did some digging on the “dogs” and put together some info I think you’ll enjoy. Be sure to make mine a little burnt, and serve ‘em up … and happy “dog in hand!”
Of course there’s a hot dog song ….
A hot dog is a grilled, steamed, or boiled sausage served in the slit (or hole) of a partially sliced bun. The term hot dog can also refer to the sausage itself, a wiener (Vienna sausage) or a frankfurter (Frankfurter Würstchen, also just called frank).
The word frankfurter comes from Frankfurt, Germany, where pork sausages similar to hot dogs originated. These sausages, Frankfurter Würstchen, were known since the 13th century and given to the people on the occasion of imperial coronations, starting with the coronation of Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor. Johann Georg Lahner, an 18th/19th century butcher from the Franconian city of Coburg, is said to have brought the Frankfurter Würstchen to Vienna, where he added beef to the mixture and simply called it Frankfurter.
It is not definitively known who started the practice of serving the sausage in the bun. One of the strongest claims comes from Harry M. Stevens, a food concessionaire while working at the New York Polo Grounds in 1901, who came upon the idea of using small French rolls to hold the sausages when the waxed paper they were using ran out.
Another possible origin for serving the sausages in rolls is the pieman Charles Feltman, at Coney Island in New York City. In 1867, he had a cart made with a stove on which to boil sausages, and a compartment to keep buns in which they were served fresh. In 1871, he leased land to build a permanent restaurant, and the business grew, selling far more than just the “Coney Island Red Hots” as they were known.
A German immigrant named Feuchtwanger, from Frankfurt, in Hesse, gets credit for pioneering the practice in the American Midwest. According to one account, Feuchtwanger’s wife proposed the use of a bun in 1880: Feuchtwanger sold hot dogs on the streets of St. Louis, Missouri, and provided gloves to his customers so that they could handle the sausages without burning their hands. Losing money when customers did not return the gloves, Feuchtwanger’s wife suggested serving the sausages in a roll instead.
The term “hot dog” likely emerged in the late 1800s as slang. At the time, sausages were sometimes humorously (and skeptically) associated with mystery meat, and cartoons often linked them to dachshund dogs. The phrase “hot dog” stuck … part joke, part marketing… and quickly became the common name. (Some claim in Europe they included “dog” meat in the blend – eeeewww!!) “Hot dog” was certainly in Thomas Edison’s mind when he made a short film in 1904 titled “Dog Factory” that depicted people bringing different dog breeds to a butcher who magically transforms them into sausages.
Hot dogs are prepared commercially by mixing ingredients in vats where rapidly moving blades grind and mix the ingredients in the same operation. Most dogs are a combination of beef, pork, and chicken, with spices and salt added for flavor. This mixture is forced through tubes into casings for cooking. Most hot dogs sold in the US are “skinless” rather than “natural casing” sausages.
As with most sausages, hot dogs must be in a casing to be cooked. Traditional casing is made from the small intestines of sheep. The products are known as “natural casing” hot dogs or frankfurters. “Skinless” hot dogs use a casing for cooking, but the casing may be a long tube of thin cellulose that is removed between cooking and packaging, a process invented in Chicago in 1925 by Erwin O. Freund, founder of Visking. (The first skinless hot dog casings were produced by Freund’s company under the name “Nojax”, short for “no jackets” and sold to local Chicago sausage makers).
Hot dogs may be prepared and served in various ways – grilled, steamed, boiled, broiled, pan-fried, or cooked in an air fryer. Some home cooks cut their hot dogs into spirals before grilling or pan-frying to increase the surface area, which allows for a better Maillard reaction (SCIENCE!!). There can never be too many ways to cook a hot dog! My favorite is off the grill, but I must admit a boiled dog with sauerkraut makes for a great ball game treat.
Annually, Americans consume over 20 billion hot dogs, with the Fourth of July standing as the single biggest day. On that one holiday, around 150 million hot dogs are consumed, an almost unimaginable number for such a simple food.
Hot dogs are commonly served with one or more condiments. In 2005, the US-based National Hot Dog & Sausage Council found mustard to be the most popular, preferred by 32% of respondents; 23% favored ketchup; 17% chili; 9% pickle relish; and 7% onions. My favorite is ketchup, but I always try something new on my second … (who eats just one??)
American hot dog variations often have misleading names; they are commonly named for the geographical regions that allegedly inspired them instead of the regions in which they are most popular. For example, Michigan hot dogs and white hots are popular in upstate New York, whereas Coney Island hot dogs are popular in Michigan. Hot wieners, or weenies, are a staple in Rhode Island where they are sold at restaurants under the misleading name “New York System.” In the Philadelphia metro area, Texas Tommy refers to a hot dog variant in which the frank is topped with melted cheese (often cheddar) and wrapped in bacon. The “New York dog” or “New York style” hot dog is a natural-casing all-beef frank topped with sauerkraut and spicy brown mustard, onions optional, invented and popularized in New York City. Cincinnati has its famous chili dogs with onions and cheese.
Washington, D.C. is home to the half-smoke, a half-beef, half-pork sausage that is both grilled and smoked. A half-smoke is often placed into a hot dog-style bun and topped with chili, cheese, onions, and mustard, similar to a chili dog.
Skinner’s Restaurant, in Lockport, Manitoba, is reputed to be Canada’s oldest hot dog outlet in continuous operation, founded in 1929 by Jim Skinner Sr. Hot dogs served at Skinner’s are European-style foot-long hot dogs with natural casings, manufactured by Winnipeg Old Country Sausage in Winnipeg, Manitoba.
The world’s longest hot dog is 197ft long and rested within a 60.3-meter (198 ft) bun. The hot dog was prepared by Shizuoka Meat Producers for the All-Japan Bread Association. The hot dog and bun were the center of a media event in celebration of the Association’s 50th anniversary on August 4, 2006, at the Akasaka Prince Hotel in Tokyo.
AND ONLY IN CALIFORNIA!! On May 31, 2012, Guinness World Records certified the world record for the most expensive hot dog at USD$145.49. The “California Capitol City Dawg”, served at Capitol Dawg in Sacramento, California, features a grilled 18 in all-beef, natural-casing frank from Chicago, served on a fresh-baked herb-and-oil focaccia roll, spread with white truffle butter, then grilled. It is topped with whole-grain mustard from France, garlic and herb mayonnaise, sautéed chopped shallots, organic mixed baby greens, maple syrup-marinated and fruitwood-smoked uncured bacon from New Hampshire, chopped tomato, moose cheese from Sweden, sweetened dried cranberries, basil olive oil and pear-cranberry-coconut balsamic vinaigrette, and ground peppercorn. Proceeds from the sale of each super dog were donated to the Shriners Hospitals for Children.
Hot dogs are a popular food for eating competitions. The record for hot dogs eaten in 10 minutes is 83 by Joey Chestnut at the “Chestnut vs. Kobayashi: Unfinished Beef” event on September 2, 2024. Competitive eater Miki Sudo holds the record for most hot dogs eaten in 10 minutes by a female at 48.5 hot dogs, also setting this record on July 4, 2020. Not sure what the rush is all about – slow and easy for me.
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