Hot Dogs with Relish, Raw Onion and Ketchup
current situation: 1st date, bring your own condiments
A hot dog is not a recipe and this is not a joke. There are about five decisions in a hot dog and everybody gets two of them wrong.
Split it and griddle it. A boiled hot dog is a sad grey tube. Cut almost through lengthways, open it flat, and put the cut faces down in a hot dry pan — it browns, it curls, the edges crisp, and it stops being a boiled thing.
Then toast the bun in the fat left behind. That is it. That is the whole difference between this and a hot dog at a petrol station.
- Makes
- 4
- Hands-on
- 10 minutes
- In the pan
- 6 minutes
- Condiments
- Bring your own
What you need
The dogs
- 4 all-beef hot dogs
- 4 sesame hot dog buns
- 1 tbsp butter, for the buns
On top
- 1 small white onion, chopped fine
- Sweet green pickle relish
- Ketchup
- Yellow mustard, for anyone who wants it
How it goes
1 — Split them lengthways, not all the way through
A shallow cut down the length, deep enough to open the dog out flat like a book but not so deep it falls in two.
2 — Cut faces down in a hot dry pan
No oil. A hot dog is mostly fat and it supplies its own. Three minutes on the cut face until it is browned and the edges have curled up.
3 — Flip for two minutes to blister the skin
The round side goes into the fat the cut side rendered out. The casing tightens and blisters in spots.
4 — Toast the buns in the same pan
Opened out, cut sides down, in whatever fat is left plus a little butter. Ninety seconds until golden. A toasted bun holds relish; an untoasted one goes to paste.
pro tip — Sesame buns burn faster than plain ones because of the oil in the seeds. Watch them.
5 — Chop the onion fine and raw
Properly fine — small enough that you get some in every bite rather than a lump in one. Raw. Rinsed under cold water and shaken dry if it is a fierce onion.
6 — Build it onion first, relish second, ketchup last
Onion down into the bun so it does not roll off, relish along the length, then ketchup in a zigzag over the top where you can see it. Order matters — ketchup first and the onion slides straight out.
First date. Bring your own condiments. LFG.