REWIND: Hot Dogs!

Wait, I'm gonna will while we're waiting for the buns, I'm gonna make.

Us a prosecco.

Oh. Even just pulled out the prosecco.

I did, like, what are they having prosecco.

With hot dogs?

Today's episode is all about the hot dog. My name is Evil Longoria and I am my and welcome to Hungry for History, a podcast that explores our past and present through food.

On every episode, we'll talk about the history of some of our favorite dishes, ingredients, and beverages from our culture.

So make yourself at home. When when people think of the United States, they go hot dog, yeah, totally. It is the ultimate American food. But it's not from America. But it's not from America. We'll get into that. Ye Do you like how dogs? I love hot dogs too. I love hot are We're not supposed to though, Well, it depends on the wiener. I'm just saying, Ladies saying, I'm just saying it depends on the on the quality

Because I'm sports sports person. Yeah, there's also, of course pinks hot dogs. That's a big that's a big I agree, but I don't like those. The bacon wrapped I actually my best friend growing up in high school, her grandmother used to have the concession stand.

At the Bickles and Laredo, so we used to always go and get the bacon wrap, bacon wrapped and just get all of the seabroo.

I only had bacon wrap in college outside of clubs. So you'd stumble out at two am and you would smell the bacon and onions cooking on the little hot dog cart, the hot dog man that was there, and you we would always save two dollars, like we would spend all our money drinking at the club, Like save your two dollars for the hot like everybody saved the two dollars because just the smell like pulled you out of the club. It's the best. I remember having those in.

High school because we would go to No Doloredo and then that was what we had at the end of the night.

Yeah, and it's and now, yeah, the smell is just you see the smoke and it's just in ton.

The wrapping of the bacon. Where did that come from? Is that just a Mexican thing? That is a Mexican thing. We added that.

We added that that is our contribution to the all American hot dog, which now is a big part of la culture, la street culture. So you could say that it's a little bit from here from there, but Mexico is the one that added it.

Hot Dogs became famous in Mexico because of bullfighting.

Well originally they believe. It's one of those things that it's hard to pinpoint exactly when, but there is a theory that a group of American entrepreneurs, because hot dogs, which are successful in the US, they introduced them to both fighting ring in Mexico City in nineteen forty five and they were selling them as with a labeled perroscali, and so they had a thing a prero, but they didn't go over well, oh no. And then they were embraced in the northern states of Baja, Sonora and Chihuahua

But that's my kind of hot dog that I make today because of Peppe. Is this like chile bacon, jalapeno salsa with ketchup and mustards. So it must be like that. The sonora and hot dog made its way throughout all Mexico because that's the one that Peppe educated me about. And now that's the only way I eat a hot dog is with this cheata a concoction on top of it. I can't wait.

I can't wait.

But I don't wrap it in bee. I don't wrap it in beef, and they did, and the bread was different in Mexico. They used the bolo. Yes, I've never had a hot dog with me neither. I don't think I have. No. I love a hot dog with brioche buns. Oh that sounds really good. Soft? Yeah, soft?

But then if the hot dog bun is really soft, can it hold up to all of these toppings.

I don't think it matters.

I think it just goes in my mouth. It does fall apart, and it's also sweeter. It's a briosh Yeah, a little, it's a little sweeter, but it's fun. It's a really fun. It feels like a sophistic bie hot dog.

Well just because you get to say brios, just because you say brios eva doesn't mean it's bougie exactly. No. Nomo is the city that started adding with so you have alio. Then they added pinto beans and mayo and avocado.

It's like this hardy, heavy duty, you know, hot dog.

And from there it spread to other urban cities, which is how we make which is how it made its way to La.

I feel like I've never gone to a restaurant to get a hot dog. It's always a street vender. It's always a street vender. Yeah, I've never had a hot dog in a restaurant. So this sonata on.

Bacon wrapped delicacy made its way to the US in the eighties or specifically, you know, to different cities, urban cities in the US in the nineteen eighties, and it was embraced by street vendors. But it was difficult to get moligos, so they substituted the hot dog bun.

And it's amazing.

I mean, I love going to the Hollywood Bowl in La and afterwards I always get a bacon wrapped hot dog. And it's you were talking about this inventiveness with making you know, a hot dog with just you know, sausage. But the street vendors they'll have a sterno and put a baking sheet over a sterno and then just cook the hot dogs and their carts from there. And I wanted to give a shout out to Medicaid Sanchez, who we featured in our Street Vendors episode last season of Sammy's.

She sells an amazing bacon wrap hot dog. It's amazing, amazing, amazing. She also has vegan ones at the Piata District in La. Right, she's just there on the weekend.

She's just air on the weekend, Saturdays and Sundays, words Sunday li it is. It is fantastic and her look, this are out of this world.

Oh my gosh, that's so great. Are there hot dogs in Latin America and South America?

Yeah, there are some countries like Colombia. Top them with pineapple sauce and crat potato chips.

The crushed potato.

Chips sounds amazing. That sounds that right. Pineapple I have to taste. I do love pineapples. I'd have to taste. Wait, Venezuela tops them with cabbage and carrots and onions and strategy I don't know about. I don't know about the cabbaging carrots. Guys, it's interesting. It's in Venezuela. I gotta ask Wilma Rolderama. He does that.

See he doesn't make them. Brazilians add ground beef, corn and carrot.

Well, that just sounds like like a chill pie. Oh yeah, we're also like a too. That that's now, that's just a whole different dish. Okay, brazil We wait. Guatemalans they call them schucos and they have traditional ketchup mustard and mayo. But then they put coal slaw and this cheatmol which is a roasted tomato sauce and avocados. I'm not mad at this one.

Yeah, it sounds interesting. I'm curious about the roasted tomato sauce. Argentina calls them totty ban, like toty son ban, and.

They, of course they do Argentina. That sounds so good. When we come back, I am cooking Betha's favorite hot dog, inspired by his favorite hot dog cart in Mexico City called hot dogs Glan. I can't wait, so stay with us, hungry for history. We'll be right back. So we are in the kitchen making hot dogs Galan, which is named after this hot dog cart in Mexico City that was super famous when.

Pepe was young.

I think it's still around.

I can't remember what he told me.

And they would come out of the clubs at night and this guy would be there of making the hot dogs goal on which is it was his own sauce, like nobody made it like him. But it's just onions, jalapennos, crispy bacon, mustard ketchup and.

I'm missing something and cheese.

Oh and tomatoes. That's what I was like, I'm missing something, okay and tomatoes. He told me what was in it, and I go, I could probably make that, and then I tried it.

He nailed it, and I nailed it, and it was like, this is it?

You did it, because you know if it was like I don't know, it has this this in it? And I was like, well, thanks, that's helpful, so this might be not exact. I already cooked the bacon, I just need you to chop it into tiny.

Pieces okay, and it's extra like yeah, just really tiny like.

But not big like bacon bits. Okay. And I'm gonna chop an onion, so I like to throw the onions and tomato in burst, so it starts like cooking down.

Oh you cook a tomato in the onion yeah, oh okay, so it's not a p there, it's like a sauce.

It's a warm sauce. Yeah. But I guess this is this peak with the gyle because it's jalapenio, onion and tomato well cooked but cooked sign that. So because I fried that bacon earlier, I'm gonna use the bacon grease as my base as one would, right.

Yeah, it's the best kind of fat because it has all the flavor.

Yeah.

And then when you diced up these tomatoes both, yeah, it kind of gets cooked down, so it doesn't need to be as precise as peak with the guy.

Okay.

I try to do like right now, I'm doing half an onion and to eat tomatoes. I would make it more tomato we normally, but I only have three tomatoes.

Okay for those people that might not now, galan.

Means hands hand.

But like like a hot guy like a super hot guy.

Like wow, he's a galan.

Like he's a heart throb, heart throb. Yeah, oh, this already smells good just for the bacon grease and with the juice.

Okay, yeah, give me that juice.

We're gonna use some canned holopenios and we're gonna these you want to dice up pretty pretty small? Okay, I'd like to get the slight the yeah, but not the little rings, like the rings because they're easier to chop up. Oh I see, Okay, I don't know why, but like like not your halpenios. Yes.

So we're gonna use two seven ounce cans.

Oh my gosh, this smells so good.

Actually, I'm gonna probably do let's do a can and a half because you know, you never know how spicy you're How are they is super spicy?

I love spicy?

I do too.

Sorry.

In the meantime, I'm gonna oil are I'm gonna boil our wieners so they're not grilled. They are, but I boil them then grill them.

Ah, Hebrew Hebrew National is this good?

So I'm using Hebrew National Kosher beef francs.

Okay, so you how many putting in there fores.

I'm just putting in four for us because it's just for us. But you know, let me make sure this is cooking down.

Let me see what it looks like.

It's just cooking down. Okay.

So it's just basically tomato onion cooking and bacon grease, and they're getting really nice and saucy. And I'm going to add the can and a half of diceds pickled capenos.

Pickled penos, and again.

Depending on your on desire.

Hot spicy, depending on how spicy pekan they, how pekan they you want it. The bacon and cheese come in at the end, okay, because once you put the cheese in, Actually, if it's this processed stuff, you know, craft and forestyle Mexican cheese, Like, if it's this, there's a lot of stuff in these so once you heat it after a while,

Oh I know, gosh, look at it, because.

Maybe maybe stop showing me that even what's in the cheese you're gonna put I mean, I wonder what's I wonder what he puts in?

Probably the same. No, it's probably is it that kind of cheese. I mean it's probably better. I'm saying has No, he doesn't know anything.

Come on, he's just happy that you're making He's just.

Happy that I learned it on my own.

Without even tasting it.

With never tasting it my life. So I'm gonna add mustard and ketchup. What?

Yeah, you add the mustard ketchup to the.

To the sauce.

Interesting, I would have never in a millionaire instead of doing this.

Yes, I use yellow mustard. It should be yellow mustard. And a lot of times I use waterburger ketchup. Okay, so it's spicy. Yeah, waterburger ketchup has this spicy ketchup. So then I mix it and then I kind of taste like, Ooh, I put too much mustard, and then I put more ketchup where I go, Oh it needs more ketchup or more more whatever.

Wait, how did you figure out that it had mustard and ketchup?

No, it's me.

Oh he told you Okay, that looks so good. Good.

I feel like it's a little too mustardy.

I don't want it too sweet either, because the onions give a little sweetness.

I love ketchup and mustard.

So I'm gonna turn this down really low. Okay, and just let that sit there.

And what consistency are you looking for?

Like a sauce that you're gonna pour over. Once we put the cheese, it'll harden up. Like I said, you put the cheese and it kind of stippens up. So okay, when you put it on your hot dog, it doesn't move, it's kind of it just stays in place.

Okay, So let's that looks So.

Let's look that up a little bit. And then our boil or our hot dogs are boiling, and let's put the.

So how long do you boil the hot dogs?

Five?

Five minutes?

Yeah?

Okay, all right, let's put our buns in the oven. Buns go in the oven. While we're waiting for the buns, I'm gonna make.

Us a prosecco.

Oh even just pulled out the prosecco.

I did.

But let me tell you this is my this is I'm Mexican.

Martha. Stewart because.

I always have prosecco in the fridge and I always have my orange juice rose.

Shaped ice cube.

That's beautiful and it's so pretty. But I mean, this is like you're ready for a party anytime. I'm a watching party.

I'm Stewart. I'm the Mexican Mexican Martha Stewart.

I love it, Like, don't don't catch me without orange ice cubes. Guys, it's beautiful.

If I feel so special, it is.

It does make me feel fancy.

Yeah, I feel fancy, I said.

Look, and then it's so pretty when you pour it. It just makes you drink so pretty.

Tee you see vai, thank you?

Like why are they having persco without dogs?

So I usually would now take these on the grill and just should get some marks on them. Okay, we don't need to do that, but you know what, that's a good question. I boil till they pop.

Then I know they're like really okay, I.

Never trust, like even ready to ready to eat shrimp or hot dogs or I'm just like I don't know, I'm gonna cook this again. Just think yeah, oh my gosh, see, look the buns don't take a long time They literally took like four minutes because you don't want to burn them. Okay, you're gonna pour while I stir.

Oh, so you mix it. I see what you're saying. Now you mix it into the suck for it.

Tell me why that's good? And again you can do this to your consistency and your liking.

But see, look that's the.

Sauce that Oh my god, okay.

Makeup artist along just walked in.

But that's it. That's good.

Okay, that's enough cheese. Now get the bacon cheese.

Oh sos it in the bacon.

Okay, okay, so we just added the cheese and our sauce.

And now you're gonna add your bacon.

Oh my god, that looks amazing.

And there you govol.

So you want to just sit for a couple of minutes just to let the cheese really melt.

That's it. So let's get our own our dogs in the bun. See how toasts you that little toasted?

You want it a little, a little crunchy there.

I love a nice and toasty book.

So this is the sauce. Oh my gosh, my husband's gonna die.

Yep. Let me look at that.

The other thing I love about this hot Dog's gull on sauce is you can put it on hot dogs, you can put on a hamburger, you can put it on eggs, you can put it on like it's just a great spice versatile sauce. Look at that bund's perfectly toasted.

This is amazing, Yeah, like amazing, Holy shit. I can taste the crunch of the bacon.

The bacon.

The texture of the bacon.

Is because you like the bacon wrapt, which I find sometimes too soft.

That's my son, he's gonna want some.

I find some as a bacon wrap is too soft, and when you take a bite, like the whole thing's coming out and you're kind of fighting with the bacon when you chop it up like this, I actually like it, super crispy like bacon bits. I think I like this better. Yeah, cheers to season two.

Won't you married you? I know I would marry you.

I'm a pretty good catch.

Don't go anywhere, hungry for history.

Will be right back after the break.

This is something I've always wanted to a win who thought of sausage just in general, the concept of like stuffing intestines with stuff.

It's weird.

It's so weird.

It's a weird thing, but it also makes sense.

Is it from Germany? Well no, no, actually it goes for a spot.

We don't really know exactly, but there's a mention of blood sausage in Homer's Odyssey that dates back to the ninth century BC BC. Before the Jesus, there was hot dogs.

Well, well, I don't know. We can call it American.

Now, No, no, everything comes from somewhere else, right, But in the first century, Guias, the cook of Roman emperor Nero, who loved food and was this crazy guy.

At the time, it was a customed.

To starve pigs for one week to cleanse it before cooking.

And the story is that one.

Day Guias thought this, this pig isn't ready whatever. It was already cooked. So they cut the roasted pig open and the intestine was perfectly clean, and so he got the idea of getting meat, ground meat and spices and stuffing it and making links.

And that is the first sauce sauce. It that sounds so odd to me that somebody goes, this is a good idea. That sounds almost like on serial killery.

Okay, it was a little weird, it's a little weird, but at the same time it makes sense. Talk about being resourceful. It's like, oh wait a minute, we could take this natural. You know, it's a piece of an intestine, and it makes sense that they would, you know, fill it.

But me, it's just from like Spain, and you take off that part. Yeah, you can eat it, or we're supposed to not eat it.

Well, I think it depends because sometimes it's natural and sometimes it's made out of, you know, cellulose.

So sometimes it's natural intestine and sometimes it's.

Fake and sometimes I don't know if cellulose is fake. I think that it's all edible, right, it must be edible. I'm eating it.

Yeah, I'm eating the hot dog. Yeah.

So it's basically ground meat with spices.

Beef, poultry. Ooh, gamey meat. I bet you venison. I've had venison turney son. It's delicious. Oh yeah. And then what is where's the word sausage come from?

It derives from the Latin sansus, which means salted or.

Preserved by salting. Wait. Sorry, that was in Rome, Ancient Rome, ancient ancient Rome, and then it made its way to Germany. It made its way through Europe, and then it made its way to Germany.

Okay, Frankfurt in Germany claims to have invented the Frankfurt around fourteen eighty five, and Vienna says to be the true originators of the wiener worst worst.

So these are and these were became served. This made so much sense because then the German immigrants went to New York. Exactly, New York exactly, they were the first to sell wieners and sour kraut and milk rolls from street carts in the eighteen sixties. And oh my god, around the same time in Saint Louis, a German immigrant sold sausages that were so hot they came with white gloves so customers wouldn't burn their hands. But his wife had the idea, because they were so hot, we should

Saint Louis in the eighteen sixties, and then they became even more popular because of this concept of this sausage in bun was introduced at the Chicago's World's Fair in eighteen ninety three.

So then it became more popular. Everything becomes popular at worldfairs.

This particular world's fair, the eighteen ninety three Chicago World's Fair. That's when Thinkey last Alsa introduced Thicky La and the Chili Queens. Remember we did the Chili Queen episode last year. The Chili Queens brought their chili to this particular fair.

This was the World's Fair. Yeah, to be seen, you had to be you had to be in Chicago. You had to be there. And then wait, what about Coney Island? Is that what does that have to do with hot dog Coney Island?

The person responsible first then taking it a step further, was this man named Nathan Handworker. He was a Jewish immigrant from Poland who started working at a hot dog stand in Corney Island in nineteen fifteen.

And then he was very resourceful, He's very smart.

He ended up saving enough money to open up a competing stand. He charged half the amount of money for each hot dog. He ran his competitor out of business. Competitors slash former employer.

Out of business, and Nathan's famous was born. So maybe Nathan's a hot dog I'm talking about. Maybe that makes sense because he has a hot dog brand.

Yeah, yeah, he has the Nathan's hot Dogs in Coney Island, which are amazing. And then yes, and then you could you could still buy them at any grocery star.

By the Great Depression, hot dogs became such an American staple that Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt would grill hot dogs at a picnic and serve them to like visiting diplomats, like the king, like King George of England. Yes, for seconds, and then his wife, the Queen Elizabeth, said, how do you eat this? Yes, it's hilarious. Why are they called hot dogs? I know because they were hot and you had to throw them in a bun so you don't burn your hand. But where does the dogs come in?

The dog is a funny thing, right. So there was this German butcher in Frankfurt, Germany.

Oh God, did he kill dogs?

No?

But he had a little hot He had a dog, send a little Satita dog. Oh, Wiener dog, a Wiener dog.

Because he was calling it dogs nd after his dog.

So eventually it became americanized and just dog because dogs n was too difficult to say. They're also rumors as Okay, what kind of meat is really in this sausage?

Right?

Yeah, it's sort of questionable, but it's more of a comic goal kind of thing.

Oh yeah, my dog. You know it looks like a little Wiener dog. How did it become associated with baseball in particular? So that's what I mean. It's like hot dog baseball. It goes together.

Yeah, yeah, Like, I'm not a big sports fan, but I love going to baseball game just to eat a hot dog and have a beer, and just for the comer.

I will go to a Dodger game just for the Dodger dog and the flaming hot corner that they have. I have to go. I have to check that out, to check that. Well, yeah, so wait, how did it end up at baseball baseball stadiums?

So a British merchant named Harry Stevens is given credit for introducing hot dogs to baseball stadiums, and the story goes that at a baseball game on a cold spring day in nineteen hundred at New York City's Polo Grounds, he placed a warm sausage with mustard and relish inside a warm rule.

And they were a hit.

Sausages had been sold in roles before that, but he had it mustard and relish. So this was revolutionary. And this guy also is credited with designing the baseball scorecard that is still used today. Introducing drinking of soda through a straw.

He didn't invent that.

That was invented before, but he brought that to the But the reason he said, we need straws in the stadium is so that you wouldn't miss a play by the bottle blocking exactly.

And also the hollow baseball is so born, you're not going to miss a part. It's not like basketball or or hockey, where like the where's the where's the that's so true.

Like you take beer, you're not missed the home run, buddy. But it was the same with a hot dog.

Right, you're not eating with your knife and for you're just taking a bite, so you're not missing it. Your head doesn't have to go down at all. He also brought peanuts to the baseball stadium and so yeah, and he said, I love this quote of his. If I were poetic, I would say that one touch of the frankfurter made the whole world. Kin, you would find a prominent banker eating a Frankfurter and drinking a glass of beer, and beside him would be a truck driver doing precisely

And it's funny because they said the baseball games were usually in the middle of the afternoon, so that it was after lunch but before dinner. So it's not quite a meal. They don't consider it a meal, consider its like a snack. Yeah, although I consider them a they're pretty well, let me tell you hardy minor a meal. But did you know that the Dodger dog is the most iconic hot dog in baseball? The Dodgers sell more hot dogs than any other team. They sell three million

Oh, and then the Super Dodger Dog is one hundred percent beef.

Like the Super Super Dodger Dog. Soup ten inches long a foot was too long in a regular six and was not very special, so they had to get a slightly longer dog than it's bun. And I do like when the selchica is longer than the bun. It feels like you're getting more well and also like I feel like the current one is it's too much bread. Yeah, that's true, because when you get to the Internet, I want a good ratio of bun to hot dog, and I feel like the normal hot dog sizes just disappear.

You know.

Well, yeah, this is why I like a super dog. You know what I learned. I didn't realize how old the hot dog was. I thought Germany, and I thought like nineteen hundreds.

I learned about Harry Stevens, this British merchant. I never knew about him before, and I thought that was really interesting.

You guys, if you enjoyed Hot Dog Galan, it is in my new cookbook, which drops October two, twenty nine, so check it out. Hop Dog Galan.

It's so delicious.

I can't wait for your cookbook, Thanks for listening. Everybody Hungry for History is a Hyphenite media production in partnership with Iheart'smichaultura podcast Network.

For more of your favorite shows, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.