Hot Dog Blog-the Final Word

What’s in a hot dog?  You’re not sure are you?  I can feel your lack of clarity through the little ones and zeroes that have become electrical and now somehow appear as letters of the alphabet on our screens.  Let me help you.

I was once working a fund raiser for my former agency; it was a hot dog stand outside a supporter’s small grocery store.  It was a modest endeavor, cooking hot dogs on a grill and selling them to parade watchers and participants at a small town community festival.  I brought a folding banquet table, two folding chairs, a pop up tent and a grill. He furnished from his store shelves hot dogs and buns, condiments (ketchup, mustard, and relish), charcoal, and napkins.  It was rudimentary, straightforward, and good.  Yes we lacked fresh condiments but we made up for it with enthusiasm and kindness.  He knew most of the hot dog buyers.  I met a lot of nice people. They didn’t seem to mind.

   

At one point our stock of wieners in the cooler was down to one package, and we had a run of people lined up for hot dogs.

“Run in the store and grab five more packages of hot dogs.  Tell the woman at the checkout they’re for George.”

“OK.  Which hot dogs?”

“The cheap ones,” he replied.

I could have guessed that.  It was a fund raiser after all and he was donating the wieners.  I did as I was told and on the way back read the ingredients from the label.  Probably not a good idea.

In addition to a choking warning there was corn starch, corn syrup, and the less than 2% preservative line up of sodium phosphate, sodium benzoate, sodium asorbate, sodium nitraite, and that simple yet mysterious ingredient-flavor.

Even your expensive all beef wieners are suspect.  Beef, after all, is a broad category.  If I’m not wrong the word beef denotes nothing more than being contained within the body of a cow. Beef may make you think of roast beef, prime rib, steak, lean ground round and other delicious cuts but cow’s bodies contain much than that.  Also on that list are entrails, organs, gristle, fat, udders, skin, tongue, and so forth.  I could go on.  There is lots more to cows than that.

Hot dogs are made from things left over in the butchering process as is bologna, head cheese, and more.  If you find an all beef hot dog claiming to be made entirely of prime rib let me know.  Knowing cattle as I do from my days on the farm, I assure you that beef cattle contain all the parts I just mentioned. The tongue of a Black Angus beef cow and the tongue of a Jersey dairy cow are for all practical purposes indistinguishable, trust me.  Let’s not split carnivorous hairs here.  Occasionally, not often, I see a beef tongue for sale in the meat case.  Mexican restaurants serve lengua tacos made from tongue.  My Mom boiled tongue and we ate it cold in sandwiches.  But tongue by itself in America has pretty much fallen off the map.  Do you think they throw those tongues away?  I don’t.  I think they’re in your hot dogs.

 

As miscellaneous as its content parts may be an all beef wiener is considered superior because it does not contain pork , chicken, or turkey.  We feel better about beef.  Some of us may have religious reasons for not eating pork.  And both chicken and turkey sound bland.  There are probably a host of reasons that beef registers higher on the desirability scale than pork and other meats, I just can’t think of any.  It’s all meat.  Animal protein.  You can get snobby about it if you’d like.  But whatever it is, you will find it ground up into practically a paste, with various other ingredients, stuffed into a casing, pre cooked (usually) and packaged for you to warm up and eat.  Wieners, frankfurters, call them what you want.  Miscellaneous meat bits are the backbone of your hot dog.  They contain a lot of fat and that’s what makes them good.  They taste like a hot dog.  That’s why you like them.  Hot dogs are comfort food.

This week I went to Ottawa’s most generic grocery store, Kroger, and perused the hot dog section in the meat department.  I was interested in the cheapest and the most expensive hot dogs.  I found them both.  The cheapest hot dogs, several brands found on the bottom shelf, had a lot in common.  Many brands were on sale; ten five packs for $10.00.  That’s twenty cents a hot dog.  All those sale hot dogs restated the word hot dog in Spanish (salchichas) and forsook any mention of wiener, frankfurter, or frank.  I bought the Louis Rich hot dog five pack, made by Kraft Foods, which claim to contain no artificial flavors or colors.

Higher up, at eye level, was the most expensive hot dog-Oscar Meyer Selects.  They cost $5.19 for eight, just under sixty five cents a hot dog.  You will find no Spanish on their label and they are presented as “Angus smoked uncured Angus beef franks.”  That’s right, they say Angus twice.  They are also made by Kraft foods and claim many things including being gluten free with no nitrites except those naturally occurring in celery juice.  Do naturally occurring nitrites harm us less than unnaturally occurring nitrites?  For that they gain the distinction of having no artificial preservatives, which is prominently displayed in a round patch on the label made to vaguely resemble a wax seal.

For all their differences, these two types of dogs have much in common; 35 milligrams of cholesterol, about 380 mg of sodium, total carbohydrates  both 1%.  The cheap dogs are actually lower in both calories and calories from fat.  The expensive dogs contain not regular salt but sea salt.  They also have cherry powder.  I think that’s for color.  They’re a little redder.

The biggest difference of course is found in the meat ingredients.  The Oscar Mayer Selects have not just beef but ANGUS beef, while the cheap wieners have chicken or turkey with pork.  Not just any chicken or turkey, but mechanically separated chicken or turkey.  Thankfully they do not go on to explain the process of mechanical separation, although I do not believe it refers to poultry being gently persuaded to enter different turnstiles.  I picture flailing metal rods and hapless featherless carcasses meeting violently.  The Angus frank package mentions separation not at all.

 

While it may be far afield from hot dogs, bear with me while I explore this poultry corollary with you.  There’s something funny going on in the world of eggs. We have developed sensitivity to what the hens that lay eggs eat, and how much room they have to move around.  We are offered on most shelves not only eggs from cage free chickens but now eggs from free range chickens.  We have eggs from hens eating only vegetarian feed and some eggs with super Omega 3 properties.  All are more expensive of course from the run of the mill egg, although not that much.

However, as caring as we might be about live laying hens when it comes to the meat of these same animals, we apparently care much less or not at all.  Granted there is some fancy chicken being sold which is nicely fed and whose meat is preserved little if at all with tainted chemicals, but those are whole chickens or dismembered chickens displayed under clear film and recognizable as distinct chicken parts.  The packages they are sold in are dominated by the color green.  But when it comes to the chicken in hot dogs, chicken nuggets, their cousins the chicken fingers, or any canned chicken, let alone hot dogs, our consciousness is pretty low.  You may want to start considering this from an ethical standpoint.  I’ve decided I prefer my chicken separated with dignity by a sharp knife, but I have to admit I’ve just now started thinking about it.  Mechanical separation, while not leaving a bad taste in my mouth, seems wrong somehow.            

            

But you don’t eat hot dogs to make a statement on animal cruelty, detoxify your body, lose weight, or enhance your diet do you?  Seattle Sutton does not serve hot dogs in her little black plastic healthy eating containers.  You could and probably should eat other healthier things to offset the guilty pleasure of hot dogs.  Kale for one.  Perhaps for every hot dog you eat you should have a kale salad, or braised spinach, quinoa, asparagus, broccoli, or brown rice. But who are we fooling?  You know what’s good for you and hot dogs aren’t on that list.  But you eat hot dogs anyway.  You know why?  Because you love the taste.  You know you do.

 

Let me tell you something.  I had both the hot dogs mentioned above this morning, the Kraft Oscar Mayer Angus beef frank and the Kraft Louis Rich hot dog with the mechanically separated chicken and/or turkey, boiled and on a paper plate with a blob of Sandwich Pal Sweet and Sour mustard.  I tasted both in turn.  There’s not a dime’s worth of difference between them, even though one costs more than three times the other.  They taste just like the hot dogs they both are.  They’re wonderful.  You want a hot dog right now don’t you?

If I am right, and you are dying to bite into a hot dog, I suggest you do this.  Get in your car and drive to:

Ambience:  Grumpee’s Weenie Wagon is an outdoor food stand serving hot dogs and little else located just North of Interstate 80 on Route 71 south of the Dayton Blacktop.  It’s next to a cornfield.  Next year it may be a bean field.  When you’re at Grumpee’s you are in rural Illinois.  In most of these reviews I’ve located the windows in the restaurant, communicating the amount of light afforded the diner.  At Grumpee’s it is the clouds and the time of day that determine the brightness.  Because it’s only open in the summer, and the only tables are picnic, the milieu changes on the hour with the weather.  Grumpee’s has a vague theme; everything is painted orange, all the signs and lettering are free hand, and if there is a logo it would have to be the decal on the door depicting Grumpy from the seven dwarves.  I’m told the owner is a tad grumpy but I’m not evaluating owners, just hot dogs.  Grumpee’s Weenie Wagon and the hot dog it serves is original, independent, one of a kind.  That’s what gives Grumpee’s its charm.

    

Presentation:  There’s a lot of stickers and decals, given as gifts by customers I think, on the sliding windows of Grumpee’s narrow stand so it’s hard to see into the prep area.  What comes out is a compact round cylinder of shiny foil wrapped in a napkin.  No flimsy formulaic red basket.  No waxed paper.  It’s unpretentious.  It’s a dressed dog complete with its own thin aluminum place mat.

    

Condiments:  While Grumpee’s offers a Chicago Style dog on its menu board, which I ordered, the condiments do not conform to a Chicago dog’s standards.  For one Grumpee serves Jalapeno peppers rather than sport peppers.  The woman at the window asked politely “Do you want Jalapeno’s with that?”  To which I of course replied yes.  After a few bites I realized I might have asked for extra, but then I like a “hot” dog.  Jalapenos are different and in some ways better.  These soft pickled peppers stay in the bun next to the dog.  They are easily incorporated into both bite and chew.  Close your eyes and you can readily taste the tang of the Jalapeno in each bite unlike sport peppers which are tough and hit your taste buds sporadically.

 

The day I had my Grumpee’s dog they served not relish but chopped sweet pickles, bread and butter slices I suspect.  That’s a different approach.  They also served my dog with a small cylinder of raw cucumber and a chunk of fresh tomato at opposite ends.  Those tastes came in one after the other.  They used plenty of celery salt.  It was a unique mix of condiments.  Grumpee had me at the Jalapenos.

       

Bun:  The bun was exceptionally fresh but otherwise unremarkable.  Again I would have hoped for poppy seed, but with all the flavor action going on in that hot dog experience I think it was best that the bun just stayed out of the way.  It was fine; adequate but not extraordinary.

    

Dog:  The dog was big.  I’m not sure it was a jumbo but it seemed larger than the standard wiener.  I asked the nice woman behind the counter what kind of hot dog they served, thinking she would refer to a brand or the ingredients and she answered

“GFS.”  I thought perhaps she hadn’t heard me correctly.

“You hot dog is GFS?”

“Yeah.  Gordon Food Service.”

“Do you more about them than who sells them?”

“Nope.  Just that they’re good and nobody complains about them.  Is this your first time here?”

“No, but it’s been a long time.”

“Well we’ve been serving those dogs for fifteen years.  You be sure and tell me if you think they’re mediocre.  Cause we think they’re top notch.”

I have to say they are top notch.  My dog was cooked nicely, had snap, and lots of the good flavor that comes from fat.  It was juicy.  I don’t know if it was beef, pork, mechanically separated and previously abused chicken, tortured turkey, or what.  I know it was damn good.  It was a hot dog.  Hell they’re all good.

The Whole Deal:  Grumpee’s was absolutely wonderful.  You can’t eat there in the winter, or early spring or late fall for that matter.  Grumpee’s is a summer time experience.  And it is an experience.  It's standing outside at the counter feeling the sun on your back as you order your dog.  It’s climbing into the picnic bench and unrolling your dog.  Cold coke in a sweaty can, looking out across the cornfield, turning your head to keep your nose out of the mustard as you take your first bite.  It’s the feel of the hot dog on your tongue, the taste that fills your mouth, the satisfaction you feel as you chew.  It’s summer in Illinois.  You’re eating a hot dog.  You can’t beat it.  Grumpee’s is the best.

Five peppers for Tim Carver and his eclectic independent hot dog stand by the highway. You’ll not find another stand, or another hot dog, like it.

The End

Thus concludes the hot dog blog.  I’ve learned a few things doing this.  First, have pity on the food writers. They are forced to write the same things over and over.  It must be what writers of porn experience.  How much new and different can be said about a basic bodily function like eating?  Don’t look for “Dave in the Shack” to become a food blog anytime soon.

And don’t expect me to try other hot dogs.  I can’t go anywhere since this series began without someone recommending another hot dog place to me.  I gently remind them I set out to write about Ottawa hot dogs only but they insist I’m neglecting the best dog in the area if I don’t review a purveyor of hot dogs in a neighboring community. I may be neglecting good hot dogs.  I don’t care.

A nice woman I know thinks I should do hamburgers next.   I’m not going to do that.  There is no end.  Pizza, steak, fried chicken?  Tell you what, you do it.  Send it to me.  I’ll share it on the blog.  But if I don’t stop sampling food I’ll have to buy all new clothes.

There is one more thing to share. The very best hot dog?  It’s probably at your house.  It could be in your back yard.  Buy a good hot dog, which is easy because they’re all good.  Cook it as you like it.  I recommend a charcoal grill or an open fire.  Cook it without burning the grease that oozes out of it, unless of course you like your hot dogs black.  In that case burn that grease and the casing.  Or boil it.  I don’t care.  It’s your wiener.  Take charge of your own hot dog experience.

 

Spend some time lining up good condiments before you cook your dog.  Chop fresh onions in a size you like.  Or consider grilling the onions for a soft feel and a sweeter more carmelized taste. Get tomatoes with actual flavor, maybe when your garden tomatoes are ripe, and have a bowl of those available cut in the size you prefer.  Get good mustard, or rely on the plain yellow stuff from a squeeze bottle.  Don’t be afraid to put ketchup on it if you like it, ignoring what anybody  tells you.  It’s your hot dog.  And don’t forget that celery salt.

 

Include the sweet pickle relish, or chunks of sweet pickle, and consider a good dill pickle spear or fresh cucumber.  There is a week when your garden could give you damn near all of this.  Peppers if you like them, hot or mild, will only make everything better.  I’m thinking of fresh chopped garden peppers of all kinds (watch out if using habaneros) or grill the peppers if you want to take some of the heat out of them.  Heck grill your tomato if you want.  Do it up.  Get containers of everything you like ready to put on the dog when it’s cooked and ripe for eating.

   

Get good buns.  Don’t get them out of the freezer or buy them days ahead. This is your chance to get poppy seed buns if you like them.  Use same day fresh buns, lay one or two of them open on a plate, and when your dog is cooked the way you like it, plump and juicy or black and wrinkled, put it in there.  Now slather it with the stuff you like.  More of this, less of that, but include everything you want.  If you’re outside consider staying there.  If you’re lucky enough to have a partner, make a couple more dogs.   Open a couple of your favorite beverages.   When you’re ready to eat , pause and give a little thanks for the privilege of living to have another meal.

 

Bite into that hot dog, close your eyes, and savor one of the real pleasures of being alive; food the way you like it, shared with someone you love, eaten with gratitude.  Enjoy summer.  There is plenty of it left.