Betrayed by my husband at Christmas

Sometimes you don’t want to know how the Hot Dog (Surprise) gets made

“You take chopped hot dogs, some cheddar cheese, hardboiled eggs, pickles, Heinz chili sauce, and mayonnaise and put them in a meat grinder or food processor and then smear the filling inside hot dog buns. Then you wrap them in tin foil and bake them.”

“Sorry, I know it’s winter but can we roll the windows down, I’m getting nauseous.”

I had made the mistake of asking Jeff to explain “hot dog surprise,” his beloved family’s traditional holiday dish while we were driving and had no idea that the description alone would create such an unfortunate and vivid picture. The same highly active imagination that kept me from going to horror movies for fear of the nightmares about my own demise was in overdrive trying to understand how to bring a great attitude to Jeff’s family Christmas celebration.

First Jeff tried to defend: “in some ways, it’s a lot like a warm, rustic pâté but with the pickles already in it.”

Then he tried to appease: “you don’t have to eat it if you don’t want to… and it may not even be there. I don’t even remember who makes it.”

As it stood, I had not made a great impression with Jeff’s family between ordering wine at a “cousin’s beer night” and accidentally not inviting multiple members of his family to our wedding. While I blamed Jeff for both — he knows I hate beer, why not tell me to get a cider?! AND how would I ever know the members of his family I had never met before — I’d been on the other side of meeting your relative’s girlfriend (second wife, in my case) and I knew it was always her fault.

My first Christmas lunch with them needed to go well. I hate making a terrible impression (surprising, I know, given I’m publicly posting under my own name on the internet) and all three of my stepkids would be there and we were still in the early days of relationship building. At the same time, if the mere description of “hot dog surprise,” a name that now had an ominous instead of fun(!) sound, was enough to make me ill, how could I get through it with my notorious lack of a poker face?

Jeff kept downplaying any of my concerns. He claimed no one was offended by not being invited to the wedding (I wouldn’t know, I hadn’t met them yet). He said I was fine to decline the “hot dog surprise” if offered and even promised to eat mine if necessary. Apparently, he wasn’t kidding when he said he loved them.

About two weeks before the Christmas pot luck, Jeff and I received a note from one of his aunts who wanted to call out that while she had given us a shared gift from 12 members of the family, only she had received a thank you note. She named other family members who received individual thank you notes and included a photo copy of her thank you note.

I was, once again, mortified. I had made Jeff responsible for thank you notes for only members of his family — a short list given how many he’d forgotten to invite — while I handled close to 100 on my own. He explained to me that he had seen her gift was from 12 people and so he addressed the envelope to her but on the inside used 80% of the interior space to list all the contributors. Something that was also clear in his aunt’s photo copy.

In my family, thank you note etiquette was sacrilege. My mother and her sisters used to read each other their thank you notes from the next generation on the phone to confirm no one had done any kind of analog copy/paste job. I just felt like I was starting this entire marriage in the hole despite not doing anything wrong beyond ordering a glass of terrible wine at a pub and outsourcing Jeff’s family to Jeff.

The day of the party, I was experiencing extreme stress. Multiple people probably thought I was rude. I was about to be served warm hot dog pâté. And I have zero poker face. I felt some comfort in our plan: I would politely decline, Jeff would eat if I wasn’t able to decline, and, as he told me several times, he really only cared if his mom and sister liked me at the end of the day, so I thought I was mostly in the clear.

We showed up with the kids, and it was honestly a shockingly warm welcome compared to what I had pictured. In addition, we had a super easy out because we did have to get the kids back to their mom’s and catch a flight so I knew any social discomfort had a time limit. I got through the general buffet, I made small talk with grandparents, I introduced myself to the snubbed cousins and their significant others, including cousin Toby who brought his new fiancée. It really was a warm and pleasant time, until I heard the words I’d been dreading: “Time for Hot Dog Surprise!!!”

I saw a plate with foil-wrapped “hot dogs” that was only enough for about half the attendees and felt my entire body instantly relax: I didn’t even have to worry about eating one since there wasn’t enough.

And then, some well-meaning family member announced: “The newest member of the family gets the first one!”

Suddenly this foil-wrapped object was in front of my face. It looked innocent but both my stomach and my head knew what was inside.

“Oh, I’m so full already,” I stammered, trying to back away but feeling the couch against my calves and knowing I had nowhere to go. “I don’t have room. I wouldn’t want to take one from someone else.”

No one believed me. I didn’t believe me.

And then I heard: “EAT IT!” And then more voices chanting: “EAT IT! EAT IT! EAT IT!”

I looked around, face burning, stomach churning, expecting to see snubbed cousin Toby leading the chant but then realized it was actually my own husband who had rallied Middle and Youngest to do his bidding and they were all clapping.

My husband. The one who’d promised he’d eat it for me. The one who’d said it was fine to decline. Leading our new family in a shared chant.

I don’t know how long I stood there embarrassed and uncomfortable while they chanted. In my mind, it was hours. I was basically having an internal dialogue with my own stomach asking it if it thought it could keep this family delicacy down and, you know, since it was a stomach, it didn’t reply. I truly didn’t know what to do. There’s no chapter in Emily Post for this: hot dog surprise isn’t in the index, and the section on spousal betrayal assumes very different circumstances.

I still stood there awkwardly trying to figure out what to say. Jeff had stopped chanting, reading the room several minutes too late, but Middle and Youngest were still going, albeit winding down.

Like the voice of an actual angel, I heard “I’ve been in the family for years and I’ve never eaten it, leave her alone.” Cousin Kate had stepped forward to save me.

And then, Toby’s fiancée piped up to say “I’m not in the family yet but I’d love to try one.” Eyes were off me, the fiancée unwrapped and took a bite, pausing to go “yum!” like Rachael Ray after preparing another 30 Minute Meal. She’d just earned major points with the family using my refusal as her springboard. I wasn’t even mad. It was a smart move.

We only had a few minutes before we had to leave but I did find my way to Kate to thank her for rescuing me. She laughed it off and then said “by the way, I loved Jeff’s thank you note for the wedding gift, I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a thank you note that used the f word before!” I unconvincingly tried to laugh about that before making a mental note to add to my list of grievances with my new husband at our first Christmas.

We said our goodbyes to the family and piled in the car awkwardly. Before we pulled out of my sister-in-law’s driveway, I turned to look at the faces of those who’d been against me earlier. “You three betrayed me today and I will not be forgiving you any time soon.” Middle opened his mouth to defend himself. Oldest elbowed him hard.

Jeff responded, “it was all me, don’t blame them.”

“Oh, I know it was all you,” I replied. I then proceeded to give him the silent treatment for 15 minutes before moving on.

The thing is, when you marry someone, you marry their family and you marry their traditions. I don’t want Jeff to laugh at mine (there are many many more although none involve re-processing already processed meats) so I don’t want to laugh at his.

However, I do want to get through these times with as minimal embarrassment and discomfort as possible. When I think back on all of it, Jeff’s first mistake was not inviting several family members who lived within an hour of us to the wedding. But his second mistake was ever telling me what was in a “hot dog surprise.”

Shame on me for asking since I should have known from the name that I didn’t want any more information. But shame on Jeff for starting that chant. We’re still working that one out.

Kate saved me that day, and I’ve never forgotten it. Not because we’re close now — we barely see Jeff’s extended family since moving and Covid — but because she showed me that quiet resistance has precedent. Sometimes that’s all you need: one person who’s been saying no all along, waiting to tell you it’s okay.

What’s your family’s Hot Dog Surprise (i.e. the food or tradition that doesn’t translate to outsiders but everyone acts like it’s normal)?

Share in the comments!

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