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Veterinary Practice News Editorial Blog:
Sept. 26, 2011
What's Inside a Hot Dog?
Phil Zeltzman, DVM, DACVS, CVJ
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Ever heard of Jaws? No, not the movie. It's the nickname of a 27-year-old gentleman, Joey Chestnut, who for the fifth time in a row won the Fourth of July hot-dog eating contest at Coney Island. He scarfed down 62 hot dogs in 10 minutes, or one every 10 seconds. Which is equivalent to consuming about 20,000 calories.
His female counterpart, the "Black Widow," Sonya Thomas, won her contest with 40 downed dogs. And if you didn't know, such eating contests are organized by Major League Eating. Other favorites include oysters, cheese steaks and asparagus.
But back to hot dogs. Can you believe that Americans eat 7 billion hot dogs a year between Memorial Day and Labor Day, according to the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council?
I came across an old article in Prevention (by Paige Nestel, June 2009 issue) on "What's Really in That Hot Dog?" It was both interesting and scary.
Turns out that hot dogs contain a number of strange ingredients:
• Meat, of course, along with a large amount of salt, saturated fat and cholesterol. And it's not exactly the best cut. They’re byproducts.
• Something called "mechanically separated meat." What is it? According to the USDA, it is a paste-like poultry product produced by forcing bones with attached edible tissue through a sieve. If you are interested in seeing a picture of what mechanically separated meat paste looks like, visit snopes.com, where yours truly double-checked his facts.
• Sodium nitrite, which is used to preserve the red color of meat. Sodium nitrite has been linked to cancer and migraines.
• Corn syrup, used as a thickener and a sweetener. It has no nutritional value, unless you consider empty calories nutritional.
• The vast majority of hot dogs are of the skinless variety, cooked inside a cellulose casing that is removed before packaging. Traditional casing is made from sheep small intestine.
Here are some fascinating stats shared about hot dogs by our good friends at hot-dog.org and a few other sites:
• Los Angeles residents consume more hot dogs than any other city, beating out New York and San Antonio/Corpus Christi, Texas.
• On Independence Day, Americans enjoy 150 million hot dogs, enough to stretch from D.C. to L.A. over five times.
• U.S. soldiers consume almost 2.5 million hot dogs yearly around the world.
• Major League ballparks sell over 20 million hot dogs yearly.
• The top three condiments Americans prefer with their hot dog are mustard (32 percent), ketchup (23 percent) and chili (17 percent).
Even if we try to forget how unhealthy a hot dog can be, let's not forget that hot dogs present a significant choking risk, especially for kids, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. In fact, about 17 percent of food-related asphyxiations among kids under age 10 were caused by hot dogs.
Pediatric emergency physicians report that a stuck hot dog is almost impossible to dislodge from a child's trachea once it's wedged in. Because manufacturers are unlikely to voluntarily change the shape and size of hot dogs, adults should cut hot dog into small pieces for kids.
But before you consider this, here is what pediatrician Alan Greene, author of “Feeding Baby Green,” had to say in USA Today: "Given the health risks of obesity, the last thing we need is to redesign candy and junk food with cool shapes, so we can give them to kids even younger."
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