1890–95, < German: Frankfort sausage; see -er 1
A frankfurter is another name for a hot dog. It's the mild sausage served on a bun that you eat while watching a baseball game. Depending where you're from, you might call a frankfurter a frank, a wiener, or a dog. Frankfurters are pink or red sausages made of meat trimmings packed inside a thin, edible casing, and served with mustard, ketchup, or relish. The name, adopted in English during the late 19th century, reflects the German heritage of all variations on the frankfurter — it comes from Frankfurter wurst, "sausage of Frankfurt."
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
She soon was hired by fellow Kentuckian and Postmaster Fred C. Alexander of the frankfurter debacle.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 23, 2025
Step into any Magn or Effo gas station dotting the Faroe Islands, and you’ll likely be behind one or two other people waiting for a frankfurter.
From Salon ● Nov. 18, 2024
A proper Chicago dog is an all-beef frankfurter in a poppy seed bun with yellow mustard, sweet pickle relish, chopped white onion, tomato slices, a dill pickle spear, pickled sport peppers and celery salt.
From New York Times ● Jul. 25, 2022
The annual Fourth of July frankfurter fest normally happens outside Nathan’s flagship shop in Brooklyn’s Coney Island neighborhood.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 4, 2021
Those of you who are interested in the latest bleak frankfurter news will find none.
From "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole
Former DFB president Theo Zwanziger told Frankfurter Allgemeine newspaper, external such a move would be "an absolute no-go", adding Red Bull "want to win power inside the sport".
From BBC ● Jul. 24, 2026
At Harvard Law School, “Pop,” as his grandson called him, became an intimate of Felix Frankfurter, the future U.S.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 26, 2026
Rexford Tugwell, Felix Frankfurter, Adolf Berle—acolytes of the brain trust that encircled the president—were plucked from schools like Columbia and Harvard.
From Slate ● Mar. 17, 2025
“I did legit think that it was flavorful,” said FoodPrint director Jerusha Klemperer, a sometime vegetarian who opted for a Field Roast Classic Smoked Plant-Based Frankfurter.
From Salon ● Apr. 16, 2024
Wing tips gleaming, my hair still damp, I was flipping through the Frankfurter Allgemeine when she rolled her unthinkable bicycle in.
From "Middlesex: A Novel" by Jeffrey Eugenides
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
