Hungry?Ý Hotdogs have been around since the 1860s, when German immigrants began selling sausages from carts in New York City.Ý What made their sausages different was that they were inside a milk bun with sauerkraut on top.Ý That made them easier to carry and eat on the street, plus provided a way to keep things like mustard and relish from sliding off the sausage. They were popularized by butcher Charles Feltman when he began selling them at Coney Island, giving birth to the famous Coney Island hot dog.Ý Sausages, the original inside of a hot dog, have been around even longer.Ý Homer wrote about them in The Odyssey in 9th Century B.C. Hot dogs are made from small pieces of beef, pork or chicken stuffed into an edible skin called casing.Ý Then they are frozen, and some casings are peeled off.Ý Then they are smoked for flavour and colour. After the smoking process they are showered with cold water and vacuum-sealed for freshness. Did you know that during a season of major league baseball, fans eat 26 million hot dogs?Ý Player Babe Ruth once ate 12 between games in a double header and had to go to the hospital.Ý American President Franklin D. Roosevelt served hot dogs to the King George VI on his visit to the United States in 1939. The world's largest hot dog was 608 meters in length. Yum!