Why You Should Think Twice About Getting Concession Stand Hot Dogs
Baseball has been called America's pastime and since the peak of the pro and minor league seasons occur during summer, it's one of those fun, family-friendly activities you can bring the kids to over school break. The ballpark food is a major part of the overall experience, with some stadiums getting increasingly creative and downright excessive in their overindulgent approach.
Case in point, as profiled in USA Today, the mighty Fifth Third Burger sold at Western Michigan Whitecaps' concessions, a 4,889-calorie, four-pound specialty burger topped with chili, cheese, chips, salsa, sour cream, and lettuce. We're basically talking loaded nachos on a burger here. Then there is the Funnel Dog, featured at Northwest Arkansas Naturals' games, a hot dog fried in funnel cake batter and coated with powdered sugar, it's like a corn dog on steroids (sorry MLB, couldn't resist).
Although baseball and hot dogs have been inextricably linked for more than a century and they remain one of the most popular stadium food items (per TheHotDog.org), one former baseball concession stand worker took to the subreddit r/AskReddit to warn people away from this classic ballpark favorite.
Don't let soaking dogs lie (around too long)
Redditor FreakyCheeseMan dished that based on his time working in a baseball concession stand, he'd recommend steering clear of ordering any of the food and emphasized avoiding the hot dogs especially. His beef with the hot dogs was more of an issue with management, who kept telling him and his fellow cook to reuse the hot dogs that weren't sold on previous days, refusing to allow them to be thrown out even after two days of the franks sitting around in water during the day and being stocked in the fridge at night. His manager also informed him in advance of 'surprise' health inspections that might have exposed these questionable sanitary practices.
His cautionary tale didn't deter everyone. User leMeGusta Troll proclaimed, "considering baseball dogs are the best tasting hot dogs on the planet, I'm still buying them." Commenter TheWarDoctor mused, "Honestly, with as much salt that's in those dogs, that water is now brine, I'm not quite as worried."
Other concession workers weighed in on the wiener issue as well. Redditor MrBrohanski agreed with FreakyCheeseMan's take, noting, "Evidently it's universal law to make the least sanitary hot dogs possible during sporting events." Commenter Zentij said his baseball park concession work experience one summer was completely different, with cooks given the latitude to make their own decisions, which led to higher quality food. Meanwhile, Sports Illustrated reports that Dodger Stadium is projected to sell three million hot dogs in 2022.