Weenies – the filet mignon of our lean years

by Denny Banister

In spite of all the jokes we Americans make about them, we love our hot dogs. Whether we call them red hots, weenies or wieners, frankfurters or franks, tube steaks or just plain hot dogs, Americans eat 20 billion of them each year.

Most of the jokes about hot dogs center around the ingredients used to make them. We have all heard the horror stories about the various parts from different animals ground up and forced into yet another body part to give the hot dog its shape, but we love them even if some of the tales are true.

While the practice of eating hot dogs in buns was credited to the 1904 Worlds Fair in St. Louis, the marketing genius of selling hot dogs in packages of ten and buns in packages of eight was not developed until many years later.

Before we were married, my wife and I practically survived on foot-long chili dogs while attending college. After we were married, however, we ate a lot of canned soup and pork and beans – hot dogs were suddenly a luxury.

In fact, I invited a friend from the radio station where I worked to come to our trailer (they were called mobile homes back then, but ours was definitely a trailer) for barbecue.

After visiting in the living room, we took our living room furniture (webbed folding lawn chairs and TV trays) outside, where I lit the charcoal. When the coals were hot enough, I went to the refrigerator, brought out the meat and carefully placed it on the grill.

“Weenies? You’re barbecuing weenies,” my friend asked. I did not know how to respond. “You invited me over to your place for barbecue, and you’re heating up weenies?” I was embarrassed. My wife and I were looking forward to the meal – hot dogs were a real treat for us. Weenies were like filet mignons to us during the lean years of our marriage.

Now the years are not so lean, and neither are we, but my wife and I still love hot dogs. We eat lots of other meats now, of course, but treat ourselves every once in awhile to a dinner of hot dogs, pork and beans and potato chips.

Here is a few hot dog tip. According to Men’s Fitness magazine, look for the word ‘franks’ when buying hot dogs. Franks contain 100 percent meat, while frankfurters, hot dogs or wieners can be as much as 15 percent filler.

If you are interested in eating your way into the hot dog record books, you would have to eat more than 50 hot dogs and buns in 12 minutes. Sara Lee got into the hot dog hall of fame by making the world’s largest wiener in 1996, measuring 2,000 feet. I wonder if they also baked 2,000-foot hot dog buns – in a package of eight.

(Denny Banister, of Jefferson City, is the assistant director of public affairs for the Missouri Farm Bureau, the state’s largest farm organization.)