Daily Dirt: It’s difficult to imagine life without hamburgers

Daily Dirt for Thursday, Oct. 20, 2022

The hamburger may be the most perfect food ever created … Welcome to today’s three thoughts that make up Vol. 429 of The Daily Dirt.

1. It would be safe to say that next to my wife, our kids, the Cleveland Guardians and Ohio State Buckeyes, the thing I love most in life is a hamburger. For the most part, I like my hamburgers plain — simply having burger meet bun is all my palate needs to be happy. On occasion, maybe some lettuce and a thinly sliced piece of tomato, but that’s more of a rarity than an everyday occurrence.

Knowing my love affair with the burger patty, you will probably realize how excited I was when I came across the following facts supplied by the U.S. Department of Agriculture:

• Americans consume an average of 2.4 burgers per day, which is about 50 billion burgers per year.
• McDonald’s sells about $50 million worth of burgers a day worldwide, which is about 750 burgers sold each second.
• McDonald’s buys more than 1 billion pounds of hamburger meat each year.
• Hamburgers account for 60 percent of all sandwiches sold in the United States.
• Approximately 7.5 percent of all U.S. restaurants are “burger joints.”
• California has the highest number of “burger joints.” Second is Texas. Third is Florida. Fourth is Ohio. Fifth is Illinois.
• Seventy-one percent of all beef consumed in restaurants is in the form of a hamburger.
• May 28 is National Hamburger Day. I had no idea, but I plan on celebrating next spring.

2. We have huge news in this week’s Great Plate Debate of 2022. There is a new No. 1 license plate. Here is the new medal standing:

• Gold medal: IMDUMB. This was emailed to Muddy River News world headquarters. The plate appears on a Toyota with Missouri plates. 
• Silver medal: 1 KWIKI. This one enjoyed a nice run at No. 1.
• Bronze medal: OHYO ST8. This HAS to be a fellow Buckeyes fan.

Best of the rest over the past week:

• YODER
• GAGA K 4
• I FIX
• TY REX
• FRGIVEN

3. This week’s look at the premier teams in the NFL, through the looking glass of another — and younger — Eighinger, my son Geoff.

Owners are quarreling, players are unhappy and Cleveland is sad. What else is new? It’s time to prepare for another week of NFL action. Here are the top five teams.

Honorable Mention: New York Jets (4-2): IS THIS REAL?; Los Angeles Chargers (4-2): Part of the most boring division in the league right now.

• 5. New York Giants (5-1): Welcome to the top five, Brian Daboll. You have brought hope back to a fan base that was ready to switch allegiances at any moment. Coach of the year so far?
• 4. Minnesota Vikings (5-1): Their win against the Packers now means a little less, but they lead the division, and that’s all that matters right now.
• 3. Kansas City Chiefs (4-2): They lost to Buffalo, but it was a loss to a better team. Andy Reid will undoubtedly work his guys just a little bit harder before facing San Francisco on Sunday.
• 2. Philadelphia Eagles (6-0): Still undefeated, but still not the best. A nice win over the Cowboys helped them keep their runner-up spot. Philadelphia now has two teams playing well in October.
• 1. Buffalo Bills (5-1): Their biggest win of the year came on Sunday when they edged AFC rival Kansas City 24-20. QB Josh Allen had another Joshy performance, throwing the winning touchdown pass to Dawson Knox with a little more than a minute remaining.

Steve Thought O’ The Day
The first fast-food burger I can remember scarfing down as a wee lad came from Burger Chef, a chain that disappeared in the early 1980s. 

Steve Eighinger writes daily for Muddy River News. As much of a fan of statistics as Steve is, it’s a little surprising he doesn’t have a stat on the number of burgers he’s consumed in his life. Difficult to count that high.