Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from house stuff works dot com
Speaker 1: where smart happens. H I am Marshall Brain with today's question,
Speaker 1: what are hot dogs made from? Hot Dogs, also called
Speaker 1: Frankfurter's were first created in Frankfurt, Germany, in eighteen fifty two.
Speaker 1: At its heart, a hot dog is just a sausage.
Speaker 1: Hot Dogs are now made by hundreds of companies all
Speaker 1: across the globe, and each company has its own secret recipe.
Speaker 1: In general, however, hot dogs contain meat, meat, fat, a
Speaker 1: cereal filler for example, bread crumbs or oatmeal or flour,
Speaker 1: a little egg white, and some spices. My mother has
Speaker 1: a recipe that contains one point five pounds of pork,
Speaker 1: three quarters of a pound of pork fat, a quarter
Speaker 1: cup of bread crumbs, an egg white, a little water, salt, pepper, onion,
Speaker 1: and garlic to taste. Note that this recipe leaves out
Speaker 1: the preservatives, coloring, and the sodium nitrate that you would
Speaker 1: find in store bought hot dogs. Many brands leave out
Speaker 1: the breadcrumbs and say no cereal fillers on the label.
Speaker 1: Cereal fillers got a bad name because some manufacturers got
Speaker 1: greedy and started using more filler than meat. These ingredients
Speaker 1: are blended together in a meat grinder or a food processor,
Speaker 1: and then they're stuffed into natural sausage casings. Once the
Speaker 1: hot dogs are stuffed, you can pre cook them. You
Speaker 1: can boil them in water for fifteen minutes and then
Speaker 1: refrigerate them or freeze them. All hot dogs bought at
Speaker 1: the store are pre cooked like this. When you're ready
Speaker 1: to eat one, you cook it again by boiling, microwaving, frying,
Speaker 1: or grilling it. Be sure to check out our new
Speaker 1: video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join how Stuff Work
Speaker 1: staff as we explore them as promising and perplexing possibilities
Speaker 1: of tomorrow. The House Stuff Works I find app has
Speaker 1: a rye. Download it today on iTunes