by Tom Morrow

Anyone who’s been around me come lunch time knows I’m a pushover for a good hot dog. Not those puny things they pass off to us at the ballparks for $2 to $4 — a good, meaty, all-beef hot dog.
To me, a hot dog can be made from a frankfurter, a polish sausage, or a bratwurst. And, the only way to eat ’em is with yellow mustard and just a smattering of pickle relish and a dash of chopped onions – maybe some chopped tomatoes. NEVER Catsup (or Ketchup) – that condiment was made for french fries, NOT hot dogs.
If you want to have a great brat, get someone from Wisconsin to invite you over for a backyard beer and brat party. The brats are soaked in beer before grilling. It’s easy to find a good polish sausage, they’re in supermarkets everywhere and are great with eggs for breakfast.
The best frankfurters I’ve ever consumed were bought on the streets of New York City and Chicago’s old Kaminski (Baseball) Park. I have say, the “Chicago Dog” is hard to beat.
The hot dog was a favorite of the great Babe Ruth. He once downed 12 dogs, along with eight bottles of soda between games during a doubleheader. He was rushed to the hospital after the second game for severe indigestion.
My absolute favorite: Nathan’s franks, found in most of your better supermarkets. They’re expensive, (around $6 for 10), but well worth it. Nathan’s famous franks originally sold on Coney Island, N.Y. for a nickel back in 1916. Once you have one of these babies, you’ll never go back to John or Oscar.
We Americans came up with the idea of placing a European frankfurter between bread. We consume around 20 to 21 billion hot dogs yearly — 7 billion just between Memorial Day and Labor Day. Of course, the Fourth of July is the big hot dog day — this past holiday, we ate an estimated 160 million.
TEXAS TALK — “Better get high behind,” (translation: better get a move on). This rather odd saying is heard around German communities like Malone, Texas. Another is “shut the gate right wide open,” and, “I’m going to cut your head like a snake off.” Yes, you read it correctly. It’s a German-to-English syntax thing.
In the early Texas days, there were so many German immigrants, reportedly the German flag was flown, although it’s not one of the famed “six flags.”
GROANER — Did you know there once was a pharmaceutical company that developed a drug which, when taken by women, compelled them to go join a convent? The FDA refused to license it, though, because it was habit-forming.

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E-mail Tom Morrow at: quotetaker1939@gmail.com