In case you were in the dark, let me shed some light on one of the truly important things about the month of July: It's National Hot Dog Month. And in honor of the esteemed weiner, the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council launched its new interactive Hot Dog City website last week at Hot-Dog.org. It also launched a companion YouTube channel at Youtube.com/hotdogcouncil, so the many millions of Passionate Hot Dog Consumers can dig deeper into this food favorite.
The big news recently was of course the annual dog eating contest at Nathan's Famous, won for the second time in a row by American (yes!) Joey Chestnut. 59 hot dogs and buns in 10 minutes, then a five dog tiebreaker to keep the coveted belt here in the States. July 4th is traditionally the Hot Dogs biggest day in the spotlight (150 million consumed in the U.S.), and Americans will chow down on some 20 billion dogs this year alone. Billion.
Hot-Dog.org has some fun and interesting stats, trivia, links and hot dog history, from the biggest hot dog consuming cities (#1 New York, #2 Los Angeles, #3 Baltimore/DC, #4 Philadelphia, #5 Chicago) to the fact that Jane Mansfield was named 'Miss Hot Dog Month' early in her career, and of course the famous line in Dirty Harry (1971, Clint Eastwood): "Nobody, I mean nobody, puts ketchup on a hot dog."
The black and white photo of the monster dog, held aloft by Dagwood, can be found on Hot-Dog.org's Historic Photo page, and is courtesy of the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council.
7-Eleven stores are jumping on the Hot Dog Month bandwagon by offering quarter-pound Big Bite hot dog and Big Gulp drink for $1.99 throughout the month of July, a "real value at a time when consumers’ incomes may be stretched dog-gone thin" according to their press release. And of course if you Google 'Hot Dog', the first link to come up is the Wikipedia page for hot dogs, where you can learn about the various claims to the origins of the beloved weiner. And whether German immigrant Charles Feltman was the first (he began selling sausages in rolls on Coney Island around 1870), we give thanks, pay special tribute, and of course throw some extra dogs on the grill this month in honor of one of America's all-time favorite foods.
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