Smashdogs

cookin' an old dog with new tricks

Hey, honey-bunches-of-clowns!

This week, we’re tackling one of the most trendy methods to cook a burger. It’s where you take a ball of ground beef, let it sit on a flat cooking surface, and then, by using sheer malice, you smash the shit out of it until the beef transforms into a meat pancake.

This technique allows the majority of the beef to touch the cooking surface, and if you do this correctly, you will end up with burger patties that are pretty much all crust.

Now, if you mention this technique to a chef, they are obligated to shout something at you about something called the Maillard reaction. Here is a dirty secret that no one will admit to you: No chef exactly understands what the Maillard reaction is.

They are simply obligated to mutter the term “Maillard reaction” every time someone talks about searing meat, because if they do not, other chefs will suddenly burst in the room, pointing fingers at them, and shout, “This idiot doesn’t understand what the Maillard reaction is! He’s not gonna win his episode of Guy’s Grocery Games!”

I’m sorry for revealing such a dirty secret of the restaurant industry, everyone. It can be very difficult to hear these sorts of things, but as the greatest food writer in all of history, it is my burden to disclose them to you.

Many of you know that yes, a smashburger can be quite good due to this so-called “Maillard reaction,” which has made me ponder something very important. Why has this cooking technique only been restricted to the humble burger? Is there a rule against cooking other foods this way, like say, a hot dog?

That’s why today, I’m teaching you how to think outside the box by trying something brand new: smashdogs.

Welcome to the clown version of America’s Test Kitchen.

“Now Dannis,” you say, “You have cooked with hot dogs at least eight times in the over-four-year run of this newsletter. Why do you continue to do this?”

The answer is simple. Hot dogs are hilarious. They’re made of meat pulp, the average American citizen eats about a million of them per year, and let’s confront the elephant in the room—they’re shaped like schlongs.

I decided that for this experiment in technique, I’d have to fuck with the form factor of a hot dog. I couldn’t just smush a plain hot dog onto a pan, that would be child’s play. I’d have to re-transform a hot dog into a ball of meat, then smash it like you do a smashburger, right into a hot pan.

And for toppings, I thought I’d introduce you all to an often-overlooked style of Chicago-style hot dogs, called the “depression dog.” No, it is not called that because you eat them while you’re depressed; it’s because Chicago’s style of hot dogs originated during the Great Depression, which began because everyone was depressed that they had no money. Same.

Depression dogs generally just come with yellow mustard, pickle relish, chopped white onions, and these very specific pickled peppers called sport peppers. These hot dogs should always be made with a locally manufactured hot dog like Vienna Beef, otherwise you will get threatened on the internet by strangers. Anyway, today I’m using Nathan’s hot dogs from New York because they were on sale.

First of all, I’d have to re-form the hot dogs into balls (heh) in order to smash them onto my skillet, so I put them in the mini food processor attachment for my immersion blender.

I ran it until the wieners became the same fine paste from whence they began, and formed them by hand into artisan meat spheres while I preheated my skillet.

Behold my hot dog ball.

It turns out that re-ground up hot dogs have a very unusual texture. Think of a really soft Silly Putty, except if the Silly Putty were sweating pure grease.

Once the pan started smoking, I let the pulverized hot dog balls sit there for a minute.

You do this with smashburgers because that little seared bit touching the pan gives the meat some structure before you squish it. If you push down on the meat too early, it’ll just come apart immediately and you will throw your pan across the room.

Also, if that photo looks blurry to you, that’s because my phone couldn’t figure out where to focus for some reason. It’s seen a lot of shit. Maybe too much.

I gritted my teeth, pressed down on one of the patties, and it immediately disintegrated.

Maybe my technique needed some adjusting. The world can be a lonely place when you’re trying to pioneer a whole new way to cook a hot dog, and failure was bound to happen. I tried to be more gentle with the other ground-up hot dog patty, and affectionately caressed it onto the pan. Perhaps I’d accidentally stumbled my way into inventing caressdogs rather than smashdogs.

I’d have been perfectly content with that compromise until I tried flipping the goddamn things.

When I tried to flip both of the smashdogs, they simply crumbled apart.

I attempted to reshape them together, but just like Humpty Dumpty, they were fucked. Basically what had happened was that all the fat from the hot dogs had rendered out into the pan, leaving only tiny bits of protein and filler behind. While I knew hot dogs weren’t exactly health food, I wasn’t expecting them to express that much grease. See why I’m obsessed with hot dogs?

I basically ended up having to pour the crumbled hot dog bits onto the bun, and felt utterly defeated.

That being said, what was left did look a lot like the crispy bits on a smashburger, so at least I had that. And your mother and I will always have Paris.

It was time to top the smashdog.

When it comes to topping any version of a Chicago-style hot dog, something a lot of people don’t know is that you always have to put the mustard down first. It acts sort of like the glue for all the other shit you’re about to dump on top. If you put mustard on at the very end, you’ll end up with more mustard on your hands and nose than in your mouth, which is rage-inducing.

Then I sprinkled some chopped onions on top and spooned the disturbingly green relish of our people on the heap too.

I love Chicago-style hot dogs in every possible format, but I have never once understood why our sweet pickle relish has to be this irradiated hue of green. The weird thing is, if the relish on the hot dog isn’t this color, Chicagoans get wildly upset, including me.

This strange color renders our pickle relish useless for any other purpose than topping a hot dog. If you try making tartar sauce or a secret burger sauce with it, you’ll look at the end result and have to go through therapy. If you need pickle relish for any other reason, you have to have a second version of the normie stuff in the fridge. Trust me, you’ll sleep better this way.

And then there’s the sport peppers.

These things are very curious in that there’s not much of a market for them outside of Chicago. They’re delicious with a sharp vinegary tang and a not-too-powerful kick, but they have a very specific waxy texture which makes them a little less versatile than, say, pepperoncini peppers.

Also, if you’re not from here, yes, you’re supposed to eat them whole. Most of the time they will explode spicy brine when you bite down on them, but we consider that an experience to be coveted. Sport peppers are Chicago’s version of caviar, really.

I gotta say, at least the smashdog looked good.

If you squint hard enough, it looks kinda like a smashburger, and it smelled pretty appealing, too, savory and fragrant in a meaty way. That Maillard reaction really is something, huh? Just what is the Maillard reaction? Chefs may never know.

I raised the thing to my mouth and bit down hard, thinking I’d at least fixed us an edible dinner. That’s when I realized something. All that rendering out of fat and moisture had concentrated all the salt into those tiny gritty bits of meat that were left. I could feel my blood pressure shooting through the roof, and I imagined my primary care doctor sobbing into her hands at her office.

The condiments were nice and all, but the yellow mustard, pickle relish, and sport peppers only contributed to the unbearable salt level of the loose hot dog meat. Of course, like a good husband, I told Davida she needed to come over and try it too.

She took a big bite and grimaced.

“This is way too salty and I hate the gritty texture,” she said. “You needed to add something to stretch it out, spread out the salt, and to bind it.”

At first I was mad at the critique, but immediately realized she was right. So I chopped up another few hot dogs and got back to work.

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Yup, you guessed it: This one’s a two-parter, which doesn’t happen all that often.

The conclusion to this story is for paid subscribers—it just deserves to be seen through the bitter end. In the meantime, if you liked today’s edition of the newsletter, don’t forget to share it on social media like Reddit, Facebook, Instagram Stories, or read it to your grandma over the phone:

And if you want to see where the smashdog story goes next, well, you gotta upgrade your subscription to the full deal.

Don’t worry, it’s not a donation—you’ll get exclusive editions of Food is Stupid, which includes audio recordings of pieces I’ve written over nearly 10 years, even from my ancient award-winning Wordpress blog. And, well, frankly, I could always use your support, because this is a real weird newsletter.

Okay, I ran real long today. As always, I love you all so much, and I’ll pop into some of your inboxes next week.