If the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council is right, Americans will eat enough hot dogs at Major League Baseball stadiums this season to stretch from Nationals Park to the Arizona Diamondbacks’ Chase Field in Phoenix.
Nearly 21.4 million hot dogs will be eaten, the trade group says. And we’ll eat another 5.5 million sausages.
While Nationals fans will have plenty more than hot dogs to choose from this season, the lowly weenie remains a favorite.
“Hot dogs, as much as peanuts and Cracker Jack, are associated with the game of baseball almost as much as bat and a glove,” says Nationals Park Executive Chef Dave Peterson. “The pairing of baseball and hot dogs is Americana, it gives guests a sense of nostalgia to when they were a kid and first came to the ballpark. It is the quintessential ballpark fare.”
Debuting at Nationals Park this year is The DMV: a foot-long half smoke with crab dip, topped with fried Virginia ham on a pretzel roll.
Nationals fans won’t eat the most hot dogs.The council provided estimates for the top 5: Dodger Dogs rule the roost, with Los Angelenos expected to set a new record by consuming nearly 3.1 million of them this year.
The Texas Rangers rank second, with fans expected to eat nearly 1.6 million hot dogs during the 2014 season. The Boston Red Sox rank third at 1.5 million.
New York Yankees fans and Cleveland Indians fans fill out the top five at about 1 million each.
