14 Hot Dog Relishes Around America

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Updated Aug. 10, 2018

Neon Relish (Chicago) — This is the closest thing in this slideshow to regular sweet pickle relish. Neon green relish is one of the essential ingredients of an authentic Chicago Hot Dog. Originally known as piccalilli, the neon blue-green color didn't come around until the 1960s or '70s, supposedly either a happy accident at the pickle factory or a nod to the psychedelic times.

[Photograph: Nick Kindelsperger ]

When most people think "hot dog relish," the first thing that comes to mind is the sweet, green pickle relish you find at the grocery store. And in a lot of places this's exactly what you'll get if you ask for relish on a frankfurter.

But there's a lot of areas and unique hot dog joints where "relish" has nothing to do with pickles. Some are cooked, some are pickled and canned, others made fresh. In fact the only consistent "recipe" is a vegetable-based sauce or slaw that usually involves some combination of vinegar, sugar, and salt.

Like everything else with hot dogs, relish loyalties are fierce. Local rules about what should or shouldn't go on a hot dog and definitions of what exactly constitutes "relish" or "slaw" are controversial. You have pockets of the country like Connecticut where hot pepper based relish is almost ubiquitous, obscure regional anomalies like Philadelphia's pepper hash—once widespread, now served at maybe five or six hot dog spots at most—and then both gourmet and traditional places that have totally unique secret recipe relishes like nowhere else in the country.

I'm sure I missed a few good relishes, but here are 14 across America. Definitely let us know your favorite! See all the relishes in the slideshow >>