The History of the Hot Dog
From frankfurters to wieners, the classic hot dog has had many names - frank, weenie, dog ... the list goes on. But did you know this tasty treat has a fascinating history?
Break out the buns, ZONE BOWLING lovers, as it's time to check out the timeline of the hot dog!
Wind back wiener
Hundreds of years ago, in 1487, the very first hot dog - or frankfurter - was invented in the city of Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany. Not too long ago in 1987, the people of Frankfurt partied to celebrate the 500th birthday of the hot dog. Can you image what the birthday cake would have been like?
Other legends say that it wasn't until 1690 that the hot dog was born, when a butcher named Johann Georghehner from the town of Coburg, Germany made the 'dachshund' or 'little-dog' sausage and took it with him to Frankfurt to promote it.
Meanwhile, the people of Austria insist their city of Vienna (Wien) was the birthplace of the hot dog, pointing to the city's name as a tell-tale sign the wiener or "wienerwurst" was made there.
Yet the first time these delicious meats were put inside a roll of bread to become the now-famous 'hot dog' is believed to be during the 1860s in New York. A German immigrant sold hot dogs from a push cart at the New York City Bowery, but the true popularity came in the 1870s when German butcher Charles Feltman opened the first ever Coney Island hot dog stand in Brooklyn.
Who let the hot dogs out?
The history is cool, but which country lets out the most hot dogs and eats them all up? Well, according to the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council (yes that is a real organisation), Americans do. In 2014 alone, almost 1 billion packages of hot dogs were sold in retail stores.
But it's not an American who holds the world record for most hot dogs eaten in 10 minutes, but rather a Japanese man named Takeru Kobayashi who ate a whopping 110 wieners!