Whole Foods has Applegate Farms grass-fed dogs, at least in New England locations.

http://www.applegatefarms.com/products/organic_hot_dog.aspx

I'm having some of these and Bubbies' sauerkraut for dinner tonight! How Paleohacks topical!

People like this who sell "nitrate free" hot dogs should be beaten around the heat with a pack of their own sausages.

If a meat product contains any type of celery, or occasionally beetroot, on the ingredients then the product contains nitrates. Celery is rich in nitrates and the food producer adds celery juice or dried celery during the curing process instead of adding sodium nitrate.

The food producer knows that their product probably contains just as much added nitrates as any other hot dog (it is hard to judge the amount of nitrates being added when using a natural product like celery). They also know that the nitrates in celery are chemically identical to sodium nitrate. Yet they still market them as "nitrate free".

The Applegate Farms website says:

"Our products never contain artificial nitrates or nitrites. Instead, we use celery juice and sea salt to preserve our products the natural and old fashioned way."

They don't say that celery juice is nitrates and that these are naturally converted into nitrites during curing.

Next time you see a food claim to be "nitrate free" look on the ingredients list to see if it contains some form of celery, almost all of them do.

I just find this really annoying.

I'm sure their products are good otherwise.

Outside of the allergen info, they look legit. Nice find, Jack.