American food . A major let down ?

Question

Recently i left China to come to America and begin the adventure of lifetime. Sure i am having a great time looking at things and all ,and i went walking too, that was good, but then i was hungry so i went to get a hot dog, i was delighted to find that, indeed the sausage was hot but it was not made from dog, any type of dog :( . My question is.... why is this sausage called a "hot dog" when it it not made from any known species of dog ?

Answer 1

If a New York sports cartoonist almost a century ago had known how to spell “dachsund”, the hot dog would not be called a hot dog.

Sausages are one of the oldest processed foods, with records stretching as far back as 900 B.C. Most corners of Europe had developed their regional sausage specialties by the Middle Ages, but the first true frankfurter wasn’t eaten until the late 1600s. Johann Georghehner, a German butcher, is most often credited with creating the first frankfurter. Back then, these sausages were often referred to as “dachsunds” because of their distinctive curve that looks like a dachsund dog’s posture.

Incidentally at around the same time a similar sausage recipe was being developed in Vienna, Austria. Like the German sausage, the Austrian version was named after its birthplace. Today Americans still refer to frankfurters as wieners.

German immigrants bought their dachsunds (the sausages, not the dogs) with them when they arrived in New York City and sold them on the streets from carts. However, hot dogs hadn’t yet been dressed in a bun, and roadside snackers often found the naked sausages a little too hot to handle.

Enter Arnold Feuchtwanger, an enterprising hot dog vendor at the St Louis World’s Fair in 1904. He hit upon the idea of lending his customers gloves while they ate their dachsunds to prevent them from burning their fingers. It was a great idea, except his customers had the unfortunate habit of wandering off with the gloves. Luckily Feuchtwanger’s brother-in-law was a baker, so he whipped up a batch of elongated rolls, which were the perfect blanket in which to nestle a steaming dachsund.

So where does the cartoonist with bad spelling come into it all? Thomas “Tad” Dorgan, a sports cartoonist for the New York Journal was hiding from an imminent deadline at the New York Polo Grounds one chilly April day. He heard the vendors’ cries of: “Get your red hot dachsund sausages!” and a bolt of inspiration hit as he scribbled a cartoon of neat little barking sausages snuggled into their bread rolls. Unfortunately (or fortunately) Dorgan didn’t know how to spell “dachsund”. So he gave the cartoon the hasty caption, “hot dogs” instead.

Answer 2

The American story of the introduction of the hot dog, like the hamburger and ice cream cone, is often attributed to the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis, Missouri. However, similar sausages were made and consumed in Europe, particularly in Germany, as early as 1864. Even in the United States, the hot dog's association with baseball also predates the 1904 Exposition. St. Louis Browns owner Chris von der Ahe sold them at his ballpark in the 1880s. While many persons are credited with the "invention" of the hot dog, according to the National Hot Dog Council the hot dog was invented in the 17th century by a German butcher named Johann Georghehner.

"Hot dog" first came into use in an old joke involving a dog's "pants" (the verb "pant" substituted for the noun). The following was widely reprinted in newspapers, from at least 1870: "What’s the difference between a chilly man and a hot dog? One wears a great coat, and the other pants. The October 18, 1894 University of Michigan humor magazine The Wrinkle contained this on the cover page: "Two Greeks a 'hot dog' freshman sought. The Clothes they found, their favors bought." "Hot dog" meant a stylish dresser, someone who was sharply attired. A popular phrase was, "puttin' on the dog."

The night lunch wagons (popular in cities and on college campuses) that served hot sausages were called "dog wagons" by the 1890s. At Yale University, a "dog wagon" called "The Kennel Club" opened in 1894. The first known use of the phrase "hot dog" (sausage) appears in print on October 19, 1895 in the Yale Record of New Haven, Connecticut, which reads: "They contentedly munched hot dogs during the whole service;" two weeks prior, the Yale Record recorded: "Tis dogs' delight to bark and bite, Thus does the adage run. But I delight to bite the dog when placed inside a bun." Hot dog became an extension of the older use of dog to mean a sausage.

Hot dog lore suggests that newspaper cartoonist Tad A. Dorgan coined (or at least popularized) the term hot dog when he used it in the caption of a 1906 cartoon illustrating sausage vendors at the Polo Grounds baseball stadium because he couldn't spell "frankfurter". In some versions he could not spell dachshund. However, "hot dog" appears in print well before this date. The actual "Tad" cartoons featuring hot dogs (New York Evening Journal, December 12 and December 13, 1906) are from a bicycle race at Madison Square Garden, not a baseball game at the Polo Grounds.

Claims of "invention" of the hot dog are difficult to assess, because different stories assert the creation of the sausage itself, the placing of the sausage (or another kind of sausage) on bread or a bun as finger food, the mass popularization of the existing dish, or the application of the name "hot dog" to a sausage and bun combination.

In 2001, the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council stated that others assert the hot dog was created in the late 1600s by Johann Georghehner, a butcher living in the German city of Coburg.

In 1867, Coney Island, New York, vendor Charles Feltman began selling Vienna sausages in buns, which he called "Coney Island Red-Hots." By 1871, his business grew to the point that he traded up his food cart for a leased plot of land where he served 3,684 customers; by 1874 built a restaurant at West 10th Street and Surf Avenue, for US $7,500.

Others have also been "acknowledged" for supposedly having invented the hot dog, including Antoine Feuchtwanger, a German sausage-maker who served hot dogs at the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair, with his brother baking the buns.

That's about all I can tell you. Have a great vacation!

Answer 3

The story I've heard is that it comes from the German sausage Weinerschnitzel. And dachsunds are called wiener dogs. Hence with the spices it turned into a hot dog.

At least that's the old lore I've heard.

Answer 4

Barry Popik established that the term "hot dog" was current at Yale in the fall of 1894, when "dog wagons" sold hot dogs at the dorms, the name a sarcastic comment on the provenance of the meat.

Answer 5

That was so funny, I knwo you have to be joking.Here's one for you.A Duck high on crack is called a quacker....