The City That Consumes The Most Hot Dogs

When it comes to classic American food, hot dogs will always be on the list. They're a popular item served at summer cookouts, fall bonfires, and baseball games. Parents make them for their kids because they're a fast, easy, no-mess meal. They're sold in every state, and in every major grocery store, with various brand options.

What makes hot dogs even more exciting is that there are so many ways to cook them. You can boil them, steam them, grill them, pan-fry them, cook them on a griddle, microwave them, or roast them. And thanks to the addition of air fryers in kitchens all over the country, you can now air fry them as well.

Whether it's chili cheese dogs, corn dogs, pigs in a blanket, or Coney dogs – America loves hotdogs. But there's one city that seems to love them a little more than the others, based on the total amount consumed in 2021.

The National Hot Dog & Sausage Council reported that Americans in one city ate about 30 million pounds of hotdogs in 2021. Yes, you read that correctly. That's 15,000 tons, the weight equivalent of about six adult male Asian elephants.

So what city was recognized as being the biggest hot-dog-eating state in the U.S.? Los Angeles. New York City and Dallas came in second and third place, respectively. The Council also reported that Americans spent more than $7.5 billion on hot dogs and sausages in grocery stores in 2021.

This isn't the first time L.A. was recognized as the city that consumed the most hotdogs. NBC Los Angeles declared the California city as the "wiener winner" in 2019 as well. And in 2017, Bar-S reported that the City of Angels had the highest hot dog consumption rate, with more than 36 million pounds consumed in 2016.

What is it about Los Angeles that led to such a high hot dog consumption rate, beating the most populated city in the country, New York (via Investopedia)? While the exact reasons are unclear, one of them likely has something to do with baseball. According to Sportscasting, California has five Major League Baseball teams, more than any other city in the U.S.

An April 2022 Cision PR Newswire article stated that baseball fans would eat 19.1 million pounds of hot dogs by the end of the baseball season, based on The National Hot Dog & Sausage Council's estimate. So it would make sense to conclude that a large percentage of those hotdogs were eaten in L.A., the second-largest city in the country, and California city with the most baseball teams (per MLB). More teams equal more games. More games mean more hot dogs!

Another potential reason might be the hot dogs themselves. L.A. is known for its bacon-wrapped hot dogs, as a PBS writer explains. According to Cooking Up Love's YouTube channel, these dogs, called L.A. street dogs, are made by street vendors in L.A. and are quite delicious.

Thirty million pounds a year is a lot of hot dogs for one city to eat, but the baseball connection and L.A. street dogs could be the major contributing reasons.