Cecil Adams has expounded with customary brilliance upon the subject of Chicago hot dogs and why one should not squirt ketchup all over them, and a number of threads have been opened here over the months to discuss his theories.
If I might move the cultural microscope over a thousand miles or so to the East, I’m curious as to why many New Yorkers claim that ketchup is the ONLY condiment that goes on a hamburger?
After 23 years of living in the greater New York area, 19 of those within the five boroughs of NYC, I still get nervous when I try to dress my lunch. “WHADDAYA…A TOURIST? REAL Noo Yawkuhs don’t put DAT on dere boigers!!!” Yeah, who ast ya?
This has always struck me as a bizarre culinary note. Ketchup adds sweetness to food…it’s loaded with corn syrup. Now, mustard adds piquancy; mayonnaise, richness and extra fat.
One would expect the New York palate to favor a good healthy schmear of both mayo and mustard, then! A strong sweet tooth is not typical around here (MILK chocolate…WHADDAYA…A TOURIST? REAL Noo Yawkuhs eat DARK chocolate!"); but fat and spice? Thy name is pastrami!
Of course, last night I sat next to a real New Yorker who was cheerfully gobbing mustard all over his cheeseburger. But I got nailed by the real New Yorker across the table, who sadistically pointed out to me that mustard was for FRANKFURTERS. I was cowed to the point where I didn’t ask the waiter for mayo.
(Mods: As I’m not soliciting opinions, I decided this query wasn’t for IMHO. And the question certainly isn’t mundane! This is important! Civilization must go on!)
Don’t know nuthin’ ‘bout how y’all yankees eat but down heyah in the South, where we know good eatin’, we dress 'em like this:
hotdog - mustard, chili (smooth consistency only - no bowl chili will do), pickle relish, cheese, finely chopped cole slaw, and onion (again, finely chopped). No ketchup is necessary with a fully dressed chili dog. Our philosophy is “If you can taste the hot dog, you ain’t doin’ somethin’ right”.
hamburger - ketchup, mustard, mayo, onion (sliced), lettuce, dill pickle (sliced), cheese(s), and bacon. Some philistines will add tomato, but that’s just gross. The philosophy here is “Ain’t no way ground beef alone can deliver enough fat to make a meal”.
Hamburgers—hot deli mustard, salt ‘n’ pepper. Bacon’s good, too. Sometimes onions.
Hot dogs (good kosher ones!)—see above.
Ketchup is just for French fries. Mayo? Yuck. It’s pus, that’s what it is; and you’ll never convince me otherwise. And my hamburgers have to be so burned that the dentist has to be called in to identify it.
“As I’m not soliciting opinions, I decided this query wasn’t for IMHO.”
—Yeah, right. I give this five minutes till it gets bumped to IMHO.
No one’s ever chivvied me for using lettuce, pickle, tomato, onion, or any other solid food on a burger; for all they seem to care I could dump an entire salad Nicoise on top of the ground beef.
The only thing that incenses people around here is the mustard or the mayonnaise. Therein lies the heart of my query. Whassup with that?
J. Wellington Wimpy: I will have pickle, lettuce, and onion BOTH upon my hamburger.
This might be a bit off-topic, but hey, it’s regional, it’s condiments. . . In the Midwest, fried foods (like your onion rings, your zucchini sticks, your breaded mushrooms. . .) are served with ranch dressing. Here in New York State, I find that they are most often served with bleu cheese dressing. I think it’s a Buffalo thing.
Ranch dressing just for fried foods? In my region of the Midwest, and especially where I went to college, ranch dressing could have been used for money. Ranch went on fries, rings, burgers, pizza, spaghetti, nearly everything!
Thanks for all your opinions, guys, and letting me know what you like to eat, but unless somebody makes a vague stab at answering the question, Chronos and manhattan are going to hit me with the Big Cartoon Mallet and I’m going to have stars and little birds coming out of my head.
Out here on the West coast where produce is obtainable all year round we have few compunctions against increasing the nutritive value of our bun transported comestibles.
Hamburger:[ul][li]Medium rare burger[/li][li]Cheese[/li][li]Bacon[/li][li]Lettuce[/li][li]Onion[/li][li]Tomato[/li][li]Dill Pickle[/li][li]Sweet Pickle Relish[/li][li]Ketchup* (light)[/li][li]Mustard[/li][li]Mayonnaise[/ul]* No catsup allowed![/li]Chili Cheese Burger:[ul][li]Cheese[/li][li]Chopped Onion[/li][li]No Bean Chili[/ul][/li]Hotdog:[ul][li]Wiener[/li][li]Dill Pickle Relish[/li][li]Mustard[/li][li]Chopped Onion[/li][li]Ketchup (optional)[/li][li]Mayonnaise (optional)[/li][li]Sauerkraut (optional)[/ul][/li]Sausage:[ul][li]Bratwurst, Bockwurst, Keilbasa…[/li][li]Mustard[/li][li]Sauerkraut[/li][li]Onions (optional)[/li][li]Relish (optional)[/ul][/li]Chili Dog:[ul][li]Wiener[/li][li]Chopped Onion[/li][li]Cheese[/li][li]No Bean Chili[/li]
[/ul]
Argue all you want but when you have all of these ingredients available all year round it makes for better eating. Ranch dressing is the “Chicken-Pot-Pie” of modern dressings. I will freely confess that it has gotten a new generation of kids to eat their veggies but it has supplanted many more venerable institutions like blue cheese and Roquefort dressing (sigh).
Now Ike, to answer your OP. The reason that Nooo Yawkers think that ketchup (I’ll automatically give you credit for knowing the difference between catsup) is all that’s allowed on a burger is simple.
It is a combination of climate and proximity to so many years of Reaganesque ketchup-is-a-vegetable balderdash.
All of your East coast taxi exhaust addled, cabin fevered brains are rendered nonfunctional from so many snow bound months at a time in your rabbit warren high rises. We here on the West coast enjoy such a vast array of fresh produce, available on a four season basis that it is inconceivable not to load up our food with so many different options. We do it for one simple reason:
Because we can!
You East coasters do it for an equally simple reason:
I miss getting a cup of T Marzetti’s ranch with pizza, fer crust-dippin! Gawd, I miss Gumby’s Pizza. They had the coolest drivers, too. sigh Nostalgia. . .
From my New England forbears, the following are the proper condiments for a hot dog:
Hot Dog
Toasted Bun (preferably Top Sliced/New England Style)
Mustard
Chopped Onions (not that sauteed crap they have in NYC)
Celery Salt
NO KETCHUP
Hamburgers vary
And Zenster, if its the fresh produce you love out there on the west coast, why do burgers come with Russian dressing as the default? (At least in my experience in Washington State)
Uke ,whatever caused ketchup to be a Gotham delight was lost as their descendants moved thru Ohio on their way to The Windy City. Here in Akron “with everything” means mustard, onions and pickles. Ketchup can be ordered for your fries if you beg.
Well, in Pittsburgh (home of the HJ Heinz company), ketchup (so long as it is Heinz) is used on absolutely everything. Fries, burgers, dogs, the almost famous Primanti deli sandwich…you name it!
In fact, I’ve been implied to be a communist (on this very board no less) for not “worshipin da Heinz”
When I used to eat hamburgers, my favorite fast food burger was the Mustard Whopper. Every Burger King I ever went to had it right up there on the menu. Then once I ventured North into Oklahoma, went into a Burger King, and ordered a Mustard Whopper. I just got a wierd look from the high-school kid. “You want a whopper, but with mustard?”
Then I noticed that up North in Oklahoma, they didn’t put it on the menu separately. A friend who worked at BK in Texas told me that the Mustard Whopper was by far the biggest seller.
Ketchup does not belong on a burger. It’s only for fries, the ones I have left over after I eat my (nowadays) veggie burger. And Eve is right - mayo is pus.
Oh, and Doctor Jackson wrote:
Here’s a quote from The Simpsons:
Homer: Hey - this hot dog tastes different.
Apu: I cleaned the cooker - that hot dog has not been soaking in putrid grease.
Homer: Yeah… but without the grease, all you can taste is the hog anus!
ranch dressing and college go together like heroin and a syringe. in college i ate ranch dressing sandwiches, and more often than i’d like to admit.
gumby’s was great. everytime i’d visit iowa city, we’d get their pizza.
us on phone: “yeah, i’ve got a coupon, two jumbo pizzas with everything for $7.99”
them: “ok”
we never had a coupon, and they never asked for one. i wonder how they stayed in business…
Let’s speculate: People want stuff on their hamburger that they are used to! Somewhere early in time some New York vendor (who did this for a considerable period) splatted tomato ketchup on a piece of ground meat between two buns and called it a hamburger. That act created a consensus for the New York area. If you have problems with it I say we hunt the jerk down and lynch him.
Nobody here has brought up St. Louis. Correct me here (God knows you will) but I always thought of the St. Louis Worlds Fair as the official “bringing out party” of things hamburger and hot dog. What first appeared on the hamburger there? And where did it go wrong?
Hot Dog: (with all respects to Cecil and everyone else on this board) mustard and kraut. Thank you.
This is indeed a valid GQ (IMHO) - in a college anthropology book I’ve seen a map of the South, marked with different colors showing which regions favor mustard vs catsup as a base for BBQ sauce.
There once was a war between the Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Death squads would stop people on the frontier and order them to name a common plant the squad was carrying. If the captive gave the name in either Spanish or French he could be killed, depending on the nationality of the death squad. With this in mind, should New York ever go to war with Chicago, beware of gangs of toughs who offer you a hamburger and ask “whaddle ya have on that?”
I knew New Yorkers were perverse, but I never heard that they ate ketchup on hamburgers. When I was a kid we ate our hamburger patties with ketchup, and that’s good, but when you put it on bread, it’s a different matter. A hamburger wants mayonnaise, or Miracle Whip, and a little mustard.
Mayonnaise has to be Hellmann’s (unless there are some good regional varieties I haven’t encountered) or homemade, which is a whole different animal.
However, I don’t eat mayonnaise any more; it’s against my religion now. I’ve been making egg sandwiches lately with ketchup and sour cream, and I think they’re good. Of course this is someone who used to make baloney-and-peanut butter sandwiches when he was a kid. With pickles.
Teetering on the edge of vegetarianism, I’d like to know if anyone has found a good non-soy, non-dairy substitute for sour cream.
