Every so often, the internet decides it needs to argue about food.
And you might be thinking that it’s about quality, or taste, or even sourcing. But surely not about classification, right? Yet somehow, the debate that keeps resurfacing is this: is a hot dog a sandwich, a taco, or something else entirely?
To be clear, we didn’t start this argument — but as people who love food and love a good hot take, we couldn’t resist joining in. Especially when hot dogs, sandwiches, and tacos all start getting pulled into the same sentence like they’re required to defend themselves.
So let’s dig in.
First, Let’s Establish The Basics
A hot dog, in its most basic form, is a sausage placed into a hot dog bun — usually a split roll, hinged but still connected. This is important. You add a condiment or five, maybe some onions, maybe a little sport pepper energy if you’re in Chicago, and there you go.
Structurally, it’s not complicated. Emotionally? Apparently very complicated.
Because once you start breaking it down into slices of bread and hinge points, things start to spiral quickly. Thus, the argument begins.
Argument #1: The Hot Dog Is a Sandwich
This is the most common stance in the sandwich category, and it usually starts with a definition.
According to Merriam-Webster, a sandwich is “two or more slices of bread or a split roll having a filling in between.” Again, sometimes those slices are separate. Sometimes they’re connected. Cue the argument that a piece of bread doesn’t stop being bread just because it’s attached to itself.
People in this camp will point to:
- Subs
- Hoagies
- Open-faced sandwiches
- Anything that isn’t strictly two floppy pieces of toast
If a hamburger counts as a sandwich, which apparently it does, but this is a different argument entirely, then why wouldn’t a hot dog qualify as well?
From this perspective, hot dogs as sandwiches makes dictionary sense. The bun is a type of bread. The sausage is the filling. Case closed.
Or so they say.
Argument #2: The Hot Dog Is a Taco
This is where things get spicy, and where taco lovers start smiling.
The taco argument is less about tradition and more about structure. Enter the cube rule, a fun yet chaotic system that classifies food based on where the starch sits. Under this logic, foods like tacos, burritos, quesadillas, and even the occasional calzone all live in the same general family tree.
A taco, after all, is a filling inside a folded tortilla. It’s open on top. It’s eaten vertically. The toppings are layered after assembly.
Sound familiar?
A hot dog bun isn’t a tortilla, of course, but it is a folded starch delivery system. The condiment situation is similar, as well as the eating experience. And if we’re being honest, this is the most fun argument to make.
Especially around here, where tacos are serious business.
Argument #3: Stop This Nonsense. It’s Just a Hot Dog.
Although there are some points to the other arguments, this is the camp many people find themselves drifting toward.
Because not everything needs to fit neatly into the sandwich category. Some foods are iconic precisely because they’re their own thing.
A hot dog isn’t trying to be a hamburger, even though the two are constantly compared. It’s not asking to be measured against slices of bread, or folded starch logic, or what New York might think about classification versus tradition.
In fact, the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council has famously weighed in on this, stating that a hot dog is… a hot dog. Not a sandwich. Not a taco. Just itself.
And to us, that feels right.
Hot dogs show up at Major League Baseball games, backyard cookouts, street corners, and summer festivals without needing to be defined or defended. And they certainly don’t need to be folded into a larger philosophical argument about bread geometry.
So Where Do We Land?
Of course, all of this depends on where you’re standing. In some places, a hot dog is just a hot dog. Around Chicago and the near west suburbs, it’s something closer to shared language. Maybe your answer is Pete’s Red Hots. Maybe it’s Parky’s. Maybe you go classic and default to Portillo’s without apology. Or maybe you’re quietly in the know about how good the hot dogs inside Home Depot actually are—yes, we’re serious. And if you really want to start the argument all over again, you could always skip the debate entirely and head to Sawa’s Old Warsaw to order a Polish taco instead (a hot dog–taco hybrid situation involving kielbasa and a folded potato pancake… and honestly? Yes, please).
If you want to argue that a hot dog is a sandwich, you’re not wrong. If you want to call it a taco using the cube rule, we see you and we respect the creativity. And if you want to shut the whole thing down and say it’s neither, just a hot dog doing hot dog things, we might be right there with you.
This whole sandwich debate isn’t really about food, anyway. It’s about how much we love talking about it. Categorizing it. Playfully arguing over it while knowing full well we’ll eat it regardless.
So go ahead:
- Add ketchup (but not in Chicago)
- Choose your condiment
- Eat it at a game or at a backyard barbecue
Call it whatever you want; just don’t forget to enjoy it.
And if you still want to argue about it? We’ll meet you in the comments.
But if you want to go eat a hot dog now, we get it. Take a look at the best of the best, just due west.