Is a Hot Dog a Sandwich?

Confirmed 160,567

About

Is a Hot Dog a Sandwich is a longstanding argument regarding whether hot dogs served in a sliced bun can be considered a type of sandwich.

Origin

On March 6th, 2011, the food blog Panini Happy^[10] published the results of an online poll, revealing that 54% of voters felt hot dogs were not sandwiches.

Spread

On April 13th, 2011, the New York Department of Taxation and Finance released a Tax Bulletin which listed "hot dogs and sausages on buns, rolls, etc" as "sandwiches" for sales tax purposes.^[9] On April 21st, 2015, the food blog First We Feast^[1] published an article titled "A Bro and a Philosopher Debate the True Meaning of a Sandwich," in which medieval philosophy professor Dr. Calvin Normore discussed the debate:

"I think it might also be because the history of the hot dog is different than the history of sandwiches as a whole. They almost exist on different temporal planes. When history’s first Frankfurter was made in Central Europe and stuck in a roll of bread, it was done outside the modern concept of a sandwich. So, yes, they likely are sandwiches, but only in the same sense that benches are also chairs."

On July 8th, comedian Hannibal Buress posted a tweet arguing that "a hot dog has all the qualities of a sandwich."^[8] The tweet was subsequently deleted. On November 7th, the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council announced that was not a sandwich.^[3] The following day, Redditor Cock_Son_of_a_Beach submitted a post titled "A hotdog is a sandwich" to /r/changemyview.^[6] On November 30th, comedian John Hodgman and The Sporkful^[2] podcast host Dan Pashman debated the topic at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn, New York (shown below).

On December 31st, Redditor WhackAttack submitted a post titled "Is a hotdog a sandwich?" to /r/NoStupidQuestions.^[5] On May 27th, 2016, the dictionary site Merriam-Webster published a blog post asserting that hot dogs could be considered a type of sandwich.^[7] On August 23rd, the Georgetown University YouTube channel posted a video titled "Is a Hot Dog a Sandwich?" (shown below).

On September 22nd, Imgur^[11] user nathanwplye2 posted a comic of showing several different types of sandwiches with a hot dog asking itself "Am I a sandwich?" (shown below, left). On October 10th, Redditor tommypolish submitted a picture of Ken Bone with the caption "Is a hot dog a sandwich?" to /r/BlackPeopleTwitter^[12] (shown below, right).