Manchester United have a ‘hot dog’ that is incinerated hell sausage

It’s time to grieve again with the culinary exploits of British stadium food. This time it’s Manchester United and a hot dog. How badly can you screw up a hot dog…right?

Barely inside his grave of cremated bread, a shy sausage wishes for a fleeting glimpse of sunlight before being devoured – but it’s not. It’s the perfect example of taking a food that’s absolutely fine and spoiling it by trying to get fancy. However, as bizarre as it may seem to put a hot dog in a baguette, it’s the lack of care at every step that elevates this to surrealism.

I’m assuming this isn’t a complex, deeply malty whole wheat bread, because we’re talking about a football stadium. I have to believe this is a standard white French baguette that has been over toasted to the point of being forgotten. I don’t want to say all Paul Hollywood about it, but you can tell from the structure that it was overcooked, dried out and turned to dust.

That’s before we talk about the completely absurd bread/sausage ratio we’re working with here. The purpose of the hot dog, like any good sandwich, is balance. You need to make sure the bread and the meat work together for the total experience. If you want to eat bread, eat bread — don’t put a small hot dog 1/8th from the side of its slot inside a chopstick and say “yes, it’s a complete dish”, and above all don’t do it when it looks like the wand has been torn apart by a raccoon.

As far as I’m concerned, the hot dog is a North American food. No, I don’t need a lecture on how the 7th Earl of Frankfurt created the dish in 1687. The hot dogs are American. The world can lay claim to the infinitely superior varieties of sausage (of which there are plenty), but putting homogenized, emulsified meat porridge in a crate, then wrapping it in bread is an inherently American dish in the 21st century.

I say this because the Glazers, who own Manchester United, ARE FROM ROCHESTER, NY! You were born close to the culinary capital of the hot dog world, and yet this is your pretext for a cultural exchange? I don’t even have a proper analogy for how sad it is to do this. It would be like Napoli deciding to put more indigenous food in their stadium, so they sell the rights to a Sbarro. Still, I don’t even think it’s as offensive as Manchester United’s dog.

I am a simple man who does not ask much of this world. When it comes to hot dogs, all I look for is a soft bun, natural casing, yellow mustard – and if I’m in the mood, some sauerkraut. That’s it. Simple, honest, perfection. Instead, Manchester United have embraced their red devil roots and given us a hot dog that looks like it was cooked by Satan himself.

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