TikTok Is Roasting Olive Garden Over 'Hot Dog Bun' Breadsticks
Visiting Olive Garden is a definite but distinct pleasure for many. Unlike authentic Italian restaurants, where you may need to bust out a translator for essential ordering phrases, Olive Garden serves delicious fare that's easy for American tongues to pronounce and American bellies to get full on. Like so many of you, we absolutely slam some endless soup, salad, and breadsticks when we visit the Garden. That's why we're so dismayed to see social media doing our OG homies dirty with the (tired) rumor that those buttery, garlicky breadsticks are actually repurposed hot dog buns.
TikTok is a great source for viral food content, like the concept of fluffy Coca-Cola, but it can also be a cesspool of rumors. This past weekend, for instance, Starbucks baristas were plagued by a hoax claiming that the chain was offering $3 drinks. Olive Garden has not been unscathed by trending gossip, either, like a TikTok in which a user posited that breadsticks were "just warmed up hot dog buns." It's a funny coincidence that the breadsticks have a line down the side and are vaguely bun-shaped, but the rumor — or, if we're being charitable, the joke — simply is not true.
In an email to Foodie, Olive Garden put the kibosh on any talk that it had switched its bread offerings, writing: "Our freshly baked breadsticks are the same recipe our guests know and love — and as never-ending as always." The chain confirmed that it switched suppliers in 2023 to eliminate sesame, but says that the breadsticks are otherwise just the same.
That breadstick isn't a hot dog bun, but you could use it like that anyway
The first evidence that Olive Garden breadsticks aren't, in fact, hot dog buns is apparent from a simple bite. While hot dog buns — especially pillowy, steamed New England-style hot dog buns — are soft and fluffy, the breadsticks are chewy, and have a denser crumb than buns. Also, while breadsticks may vary in length, hot dog buns are generally shorter. Olive Garden contracts with the Turano Baking Company to send restaurants shipments of partially-baked breadsticks, which are duly slathered with a margarine blend and seasoning, then baked in-house. In short, they are not hot dog buns.
With that said, social media giveth and taketh away ... and it hath given us the concept of an Olive Garden hot dog, in which a breadstick is scored and used as a vessel. However, some point out that the breadstick's garlic-infused taste can overpower the poor hot dog. Even if you like it that way, that lends more fuel to the argument that breadsticks are breadsticks, and hot dog buns are hot dog buns.