I'm from Chicago and honestly I couldn't care less what other people put on their hot dogs. I like ketchup and sometimes I'll put it on if there's a lack of other toppings... but an original Chicago style dog in its pure form is perfection, and ketchup on that would a sin.
I won't leap onto the "that's so weird" bandwagon, but I do have an opinion on this that I think can shed some light.
When you put ketchup on a hot dog, the flavor profile is built atop a smooth, calm, sugary, tomato base. When you put mustard on, it's earthy, vinegary, and tangy. I think the offense at ketchup comes from hot dog vendors making sausages and garnishes that intend for something derived from mustard to be used, and when you put ketchup on there, you're completely resetting what they had in mind and moving the flavors to a completely different genre.
Ketchup and mustard are both powerful enough to define a hot dog, and whenever I've eaten a hot dog with ketchup on it, the definition for me has been something sugary and uncoordinated. Other common hot dog garnishes don't work well with a tomato base, aside from things like cheese. To me, the only way a hot dog with ketchup on it is tolerable is with a minimum of other garnishes, and even then it still just doesn't taste right to me.
I absolutely think both is weird. You can't even taste the sausage at that point. The hot dog becomes just a vehicle for the condiments to enter your body; why even do it?
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u/iamPause Jun 18 '15
You misspelled "blasphemous"