In addition to hot dogs on the grill, here’s something different for July 4th week: a red, white, and blue pizza.

You can also make the pizza on the grill (here’s how).

When you don’t want a red, white, and blue theme, use white waxy potatoes instead of the blue variety. Or, ditch the sliced potatoes, add more hot dogs to fill in the spaces, and top the pizza with French fries.

If you want to use frozen fries, you can top the
 
 
RED, WHITE & BLUE HOT DOG PIZZA

Ingredients

 
The bonus is that all ingredients are store-bought and easy to assemble.
 
Preparation

We microwaved the potato slices for 15 seconds to al dente so they would bake to the optimal tenderness.

1. BAKE the pizza until bubbly. Because the fries take a bit longer (30 minutes compared to 25 to 30 minutes for a crust), consider baking the fries until golden and top the pie when it comes out of the oven.

2. FRENCH FRY OPTION: Frozen fries and pizza crusts bake at 450°F, so you could also top the pizza with the fries for the last 5 minutes of baking, to warm them up.

Thanks to Bubbie’s for the idea, which uses Bubbies Sauerkraut.

Bubbies Spicy Sauerkraut contains red pepper slices.
 
 
BEVERAGE RECIPES

 
 
BEER PAIRINGS/font>

[1] Red, white and blue hot dog pizza (all photos © Bubbies).

[2] Bubbie’s Sauerkraut, a naturally fermented superfood.

[3] Bubbies Spicy Sauerkraut adds red chile peppers.

Sauerkraut is a national dish of Germany, and is known by its German name in English-speaking countries (the English translation is “sour cabbage”). It’s also a traditional dish in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, in France and The Netherlands.

However, sauerkraut did not originate in Germany. The pickled cabbage dish suan cai dates to at least the days of the building of the Great Wall of China*.

The Romans also pickled forms of cabbage, which could be the source of modern-day European sauerkraut.

However, a competing theory calls out the Mongol conquests of the 13th and 14th centuries.

The Mongols brought the method of preserving cabbage by lactic acid to Europe, after conquering parts of China, where lactic fermentation was a well-known method of preservation. (If the Mongols did not yet know the lactic fermentation process, they learned about it in China.)

Each non-English-speaking country has its own name for sauerkraut, and regional variations abound.

Today, the per capita consumption of sauerkraut is higher in the U.S. and France (where it is called choucroute) than in Germany [source].
 
 
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*Several walls were built from as early as the 7th century B.C.E. The final stretches were completed in 206 B.C.E.
 
 

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[1] Flavor your water with (from the top) True Lime, True Grapefruit, True Lemon, and True Orange (all photos © True Citrus).

[2] One packet equals one wedge of citrus.

[3] No fresh lime for your Margarita? No problem!

[4] Try a blindfold test: sparkling water with a squeeze of fresh grapefruit, and sparkling water with a packet of True Grapefruit.

[5] An 8-ounce glass of orange juice has 24g (6 teaspoons) of sugar per. A glass of True Orange: zero calories.
 

[6] If you don’t have a fresh lemon, lime, orange, or grapefruit, just open a packet of the same True fruit. Check out all of these recipes.

Our Top Pick Of The Week is from True Citrus Company: crystallized citrus packets—True Grapefruit, True Lemon, True Lime, and True Orange—that the brand has described as “drink mix.”

To us,“drink mix” describes something from powdered iced tea to punch that we’d rather refer to them as water flavor packets or water enhancers. Or, citrus wedge substitutes. Whatever, they’re great.

The easy-to-carry packets (the size of a Splenda packet) are made from “crystallized” grapefruit, lemon, lime, and orange, which the brand defines as “taste of fresh squeezed lime wherever you go, made from real lime juice and oils.

The flavor really does taste fresh-squeezed. For us, it was love at first sip.

And no more dragging home (and recycling) heavy bottles of flavored water and seltzer. That’s why…
 
TRUE CITRUS IS OUR TOP PICK OF THE WEEK

We started out buying the grapefruit and lime, loved those so much we purchased lemon and orange, and loved those so much that we purchased the whole lemonade-limeade lime, the latter slightly sweetened and for review at a later date.

So this much is true: True Citrus packets have great flavor. What they doesn’t have:

 
Tasting is believing. You’ll be able to say goodbye to:

 
The packets are great for use at home, at work, on vacation, or just on-the-go.
 
 
WHAT IS “CRYSTALLIZED” LEMON, LIME, ETC.?

The “crystallized” powder is made from dehydrated citrus particles (grapefruit, lemon, lime, or orange), made from the juice of the citrus plus oil from the peel*. The process is patented.

True Lemon debuted in 2003, after years of researching how to crystallize (dehydrate) the lemon juice and oils together in order to deliver a convenient, shelf-stable lemon wedge replacement.

The proprietary process locks in the fruit’s oils & juices, capturing authentically tart citrus flavor.

The three other citrus flavors were subsequently introduced (grapefruit, lime, and orange).

Today, True Citrus makes more than 40 different citrus based citrus wedge replacements, unsweetened water enhancers, drink mixes and salt-free seasoning blends.

> You can see the entire range of products here.
 
 
WHEN TO USE TRUE CITRUS

Each packet takes the place of a fresh citrus wedge. All can be used:

 
> Check out all of these recipes!
 
 
GET YOUR TRUE CITRUS

In addition to our own stash, we’ve been gifting boxes to friends and family who’ve expressed the desire to drink more water. Every one of them has become a customer of multiple flavors.

True Citrus products are available at:

 
The regular box of 32 packets costs around $9, or 28¢ per packet. But when you start using several packets a day—as we do—a bulk box of 500 packets is deeply discounted to a mere 4¢ per packet.

When life hands you a [True] Lemon—or Lime, or Grapefruit, or Orange—add it to sparkling or still water and drink it!

> The history of grapefruits.

> The history of lemons.

> The history of limes.

> The history of oranges.
 

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You learn something new every day (if you’re lucky), and today we learned why bread tags—the colored plastic tags (photo #1) or twist ties that close plastic bags of bread—are made in different colors.

Also called bread buckles and bread clips, these tags or twists are part of a color-coordinated system that marks when the bread was baked and packaged.

It’s meant to help the market’s stock clerks identify older loaves that should be pulled from shelves.

While we always look at the expiration date before we buy bread, looking at each tag for the loaf’s expiration date would take too much time for food store staff.

The color-coding helps the clerks pull older loaves from the shelves speedily.

> The history of bread tags is below.
 
 
HERE’S THE COLOR CODE

Most bakeries don’t produce bread on Sundays and Wednesdays, which is why they’re missing from this list. The colors were assigned in alphabetical order: blue, green, red, white, yellow.

 
 
HERE’S HOW TO RE-USE THE TAGS

You can find dozens of creative and useful ways to re-purpose the plastic tags when the bread bag is empty.

Our favorite is as “cable labels” to identify computer cables, charging cords, monitor cord, printer cord, TV cord, and others.

You could purchase these colored labels (photo #3) to identify all of your cords, or you could think green and use a Sharpie and your bread tags.

Whether you use cable labels or bread tags, organizing your cords with color-coded labels lets you pick out the cord you’re looking for.
 
 
THE HISTORY OF THE BREAD TAG

According to some sources, the bread tag was invented by Floyd G. Paxton of Yakima, Washington (1918-1975). The story is that he invented his “Kwik Lock closure” on a flight in 1952.

Necessity is the mother of invention: He opened a bag of peanuts and had no way to close them.

So Paxton used his pocket knife to carve out a prototype closure device from an expired plastic credit card (prior to 9/11/2001 you could carry knives onto the plane).

His invention was later adapted for commercial use as an easy way to initially seal and then reseal bags [source].

Today, Kwik Lok is the global leader in bag closures.
 
 
> The history of bread.

> Check out the different types of bread in our photo glossary.

[1] Go green: repurpose your plastic bread tags. Here are 25 uses (photo © Kwik Lok).

CHECK OUT WHAT’S HAPPENING ON OUR HOME PAGE, THENIBBLE.COM.