The Recipe Doctor
From low-fat recipes to recipes designed for persons with diabetes, Elaine Magee, MPH, RD, shares recipes and advice to create healthy meals that are guaranteed to please. [Editor's note: Elaine no longer contributes to Silver Planet, but we have made her archived blog entries available as a service to our readers.]
The Hot Dog Dilemma
Beware the quarter-pound franks
We all know they aren’t good for us, but sometimes a hot dog just hits the spot. (Can you say “barbecues” and “sports”?) The frankfurter belongs in the American Hall of Food Fame, right there with apple pie and its frequent dining companion, the potato chip.
Eating a hot dog, however, can cost you plenty, and I’m not talking about the green stuff. Some of the worst hot dogs you can choose are the big 4-ounce franks sometimes called “colossal,” “quarter pounder,” or “dinner” franks. One of Nathan’s Dinner Beef Franks will run you 340 calories and 30 grams of fat, while a Hebrew National quarter-pound beef frank contains 340 calories and 32 grams of fat. Even the Ball Park Grillmaster Hearty Beef Frank adds 250 calories and 21 grams of fat (9 grams of saturated fat). And that’s before the bun and all the condiments you might add.
Better frankfurter choices are available in the supermarket. It depends on your preferences, but you generally want hot dogs that still contain enough fat to look and taste like a hot dog—but not too much. The Ball Park Light frank is a perfect example. Each frank contains 100 calories, 7 grams of fat, and 3 grams of saturated fat. Serve it on a whole wheat bun, with a tablespoon of chopped onion and a couple teaspoons of mustard, and the grand nutritional total comes to this:
- 225 calories (37.5% from fat)
- 10 g protein
- 26 g carbohydrate
- 9.4 g fat
- 3.3 g saturated fat
- 20 mg cholesterol
- 4 g fiber
- 829 mg sodium
Stick with hot dogs like this, and it's probably okay to have one once in a while. Enjoy!
By Elaine Magee, MPH, RD
The Recipe Doctor Blog
