zoobyshoe said:
For years I had no idea whatever that Buffalo Wings were called that because the recipe originated in Buffalo, N.Y. I thought it was because they tasted like Buffalo meat.
It wasn't until a night at pub trivia not too terribly long ago that I put the two and two together in my mind. The question was something along the lines of "What food is thought to have been created by
Anchor Bar in Buffalo, New York?" I don't remember who on my team first questionably murmured "Buffalo wings?" but in that split moment the age old question was answered in my mind, at least. "Ah, the
city!" No more imagining tiny wings on the backs of buffaloes after that.
A bit of uncertainty exists about the particular bar (Anchor Bar) being the exact origin, but Buffalo, as in the city, part of the name is pretty certain. Much greater uncertainty exists with the food name of "hot dog."
I remember there was a CSI episode* (a television series about crime scene investigation) that stated the food name
hot dog was coined by a butcher at a baseball game at New York Polo Grounds. He would shout out "Get your dachshund sausages, they're red hot!"; other vendors were selling them too, but shortened the name to "hot dog."
The thing that struck me was that the
hot dog name origin claim was stated so matter-of-factly. In truth, food historians don't know this for certain. It's a reasonable guess, yeah, but there's no solid evidence for it. Hot dog historians pretty much agree that the first commercial use of
hot dog can be traced back to Coney Island, New York. But there isn't any agreement on the specific etymology of the term.
You would think that CSI, a show being all about the evidence, wouldn't have made such a non-evidentiary claim. I was rather disappointed.
*[Edit: CSI, season 6, epsiode 9: "Dog Eat Dog" originally aired on CBS, 11/24/2005]
oops! they roam:p