The Dogs are Dependable
Jon Mael
Friends, fellow Americans, there is a crisis going on right now in sports—it’s worse than the steroid era and Manti Teo’s weird girlfriend-Twitter-thing combined. Hot dogs are being threatened as the number one sports food. Personally, I can’t think of anything that I’d rather have accompany me while I watch a game (other than one of Charlie Sheen’s goddesses) than a good old jumbo frank and a lemonade.
Let’s get scientific about this. The hot dog (assuming that it’s accompanied by the traditional bun) is the only one of these three options that can be held in one hand. This provides a lot of flexibility. You can do the wave or give the finger to a visiting player with the free hand or even put it to better use and hold a beer or some other beverage, foam finger or game accessory of that sort.
Also, of these three choices, the hot dog is the only one that is hawked at events, or in other words delivered to your seat. If you want wings or nachos, you have to get up, walk to the concourse, miss ten minutes of action at whatever game your at, and end up with an inferior product. The hot dog is the exception; you wont miss a thing.
That being said, I will say that hot dogs at most venues (Fenway Park being the exception) are garbage. A great solution to that issue is to have a few during your pregame before you head out. For example, the Baseball Tavern in the Fenway area serves dollar hot dogs all day on Patriots game days, and they’re actually pretty decent.
And finally, hot dogs are the most American of foods, and I don’t want foreign-born nachos coming in and taking all of the good mouth space away from these native-born, mustard-bearing creations. Wings just aren’t filling enough and require too much attention—you need to re-cheese each individual wing prior to consumption, and that’s too much of a distraction from the game that’s supposed to command our attention. A hot dog is a hand-held, filling, customizable, affordable and convenient tube of joy that is by far the best sports food known to man, or any other species on God’s beautiful planet.
Please Child, Wings
Michael Barbosa
I regularly find myself in deep food comas, lathering myself in a combination of Frank’s Red Hot (cause I put that shit on everything) and blue cheese. My whole existence is solely based on the invention of the chicken wing; without it, Buffalo, New York would be an extremely irrelevant place with a bad football team, and I would be a shell of myself, longing for a purpose.
Eat a hot dog. I dare you. I guarantee a hot dog will give you nacho-esque bowel movements (like what I did there?) When I think nachos, I think Taco Bell—do you really know where that cheese comes from? Come on now, think “outside the bun.”
I also think movie theater nachos are always a case of “looks good from a far, but are far from good.” With that said, I like my sports food just like I like my women: hot and spicy. Sorry for being cheesy (okay, I’ll stop, but nachos are overrated and hot dogs are gross.)
Jon makes a good point: Hot dogs give you great flexibility, especially when it comes to giving visiting fans the finger, but nothing says F.U. like smearing a hot sauce/ blue cheese concoction all over a visiting Sanchez or Rodriguez jersey. Doing so screams “Bro, get at me—I’m crazy and I’m all jacked up on Mountain Dew.”
The bottom line is: Wings aren’t served at movie theaters, they are served at bars. Wings are and always will be the food of champions, a.k.a the ultimate “BIG BOY” food (all caps, I aint messin’ around). Would I rather have nachos or a hot dog? That’s a straight up clown question, bro. I want a beer, a basket of fries and the hottest got-damn wings you got, because my team’s marching down the field.
I want to see Big Papi hit a home run all while looking like a crazed fan with my buffalo sauce face-smear. Those who choose dogs or nachos aren’t able to go to Jake and Joes on a Monday night when they offer 50-cent wing night with the purchase of a beer.
Don’t get me wrong—there’s nothing like going to a ball game and enjoying a nice frank. I certainly enjoyed that when I was, what—11? Now that I have my grownup pants on, it’s bars, beers and wings. Just call it BBW—and I ain’t talking about your weird fetish for women—I’m talking about the greatest combination in the world while watching the greatest sports teams in America.
Nothing Beats Nachos
Nick Dayal
I will not lie to you, nor steer you wrong. Therefore, I must confess that hot dogs are delicious. There’s no denying that.
But let’s examine this fan favorite a little closer. Take the famous Fenway Frank, a large, rubbery thing that may taste great, but we can all agree on one thing: it clearly resembles a bull’s penis. I’ve never clearly examined a bull’s penis, but I am positive that it must look like a Fenway Frank.
And what’s inside this bull-d*** looking thing? According to Kayem.com, “The Fenway Frank is 56 grams of beef, pork, and corn syrup.” Now I don’t know about you, but similar to Vegas, I believe that what a cow and a pig do in a cornfield should stay in the cornfield! I want no part of this disgusting cow-pig hybrid going into my stomach. Only Pamela Anderson is capable of wrapping her mouth around this thing. Watching someone eat a hot dog is about the second grossest thing next to watching an episode of 16 and Pregnant. Yuck!
Next on the list are wings. A classic addition to any sporting event, especially the Super Bowl. Now, no one should stand between a man and his beliefs, but you must know both sides of the story. Sure, we know our side of the story, the cheap cost of a platter of chicken wings that is enough to feed a small army of fat men, and the delicious number of mouth-watering sauces that are about as difficult to choose from as the menu at the Bunny Ranch.
But the other side of the story isn’t so appetizing. Imagine a full barn wall-to-wall with deformed, eight-winged chickens flapping around and pooping on each other. Companies hire super smart scientists to grow their chickens with extra wings so that they can make more money off them. Now, I don’t know if this is exactly true or not, because Popeye’s and KFC would not comment on the matter, and Chik Fil-A was closed when I went on Sunday. But just the idea of deformed chickens pooping on each other is enough for me not to challenge it. I don’t mean to guilt trip you into avoiding chicken wings, or gross you out, but that’s exactly what I am going to do. If someone offers you a chicken wing, just say no.
This leads to the final path. A path leading to a tray of salty chips layered in delicious cheese and a variety of toppings. For the more refined: tortilla chips with a side of cheese dip. For the more cultured: tortilla chips “con queso y salsa.” And for the adventurous: tortilla chips with everything in the world—sour cream, guacamole, beans, chicken, beef, olives, chili … anything that’s already good is just better in nacho form! So be creative, be an artist, and be happy that you made the right decision with our culinary neighbor to the south, nachos!
Sure, hot dogs and chicken wings may be the most popular, but I would advise you to take that road that Robert Frost is so keen on. I don’t remember how the poem goes exactly, but I’m sure the road he speaks of leads to glory. And if you look up “glory” in the thesaurus, you’ll find the word “Nachos” right next to it.
