Vegan Hot Dog Buns
You have a picnic or a party coming up, and you don't want to bring a bog standard snack but want to get some appreciative „Oooh“s and „Aaaah“s? In theory, I'd recommend some vegan hot dogs for that, but who wants to carry around a giant bag of buns, vegan sausages, sauces and all the other toppings? So I thought about putting all of that into a convenient, handy format. So curtain up for our vegan hot dog buns. Just like cinnamon buns. Only savory.
Step 1: The yeast dough
There's no getting around yeast dough in this recipe, of course, but since we're dealing with hot dog buns here, I wanted to get it in the right mood already. Therefore, a significant amount of fried onions makes its way into the dough and is incorporated with flour and such. If you don't like fried onions, you can leave them out. However, I recommend this little extra to everyone else – the smell of the fried onions spreading through the apartment is a little highlight for me.
As always, with yeast dough, I recommend adding the lukewarm water only gradually. The goal is a smooth, soft dough, and you may need more or less than the recipe calls for. Knead the dough long enough and then give it enough time to rest until it has almost doubled in volume. To do this, you can either leave it at room temperature covered with a damp (!) kitchen towel, place it near the heater (this will speed up the process) or leave the bowl with the dough covered in the refrigerator overnight. The latter ensures that you can prepare the snails the day before, and the yeast dough can rise in peace for several hours. The dough structure after baking will be exceptionally uniform and fine.
Step 2: The filling
I based this recipe on a Danish hot dog, which has also always been my favorite. The vegan sausages and cucumbers are diced up for the filling. This is important because you'll have a hard time rolling up the snails if the chunks are too big. A few extra slices of both look especially lovely when you stick them in the rolled snails at the end before they go into the oven. For the sauce, mix mustard, tomato paste (instead of ketchup) and vegan mayo with some dill, salt and pepper. However, feel free to adjust the amounts to your taste. If you prefer a different hot dog filling, you can, of course, get creative here – how about (drained) sauerkraut, jalapenos, spring onions or roasted peppers, for example?
After the yeast dough has risen, roll it out into a large rectangle, brush it with the sauce and top it with the vegan sausages and pickles. Then roll it up tightly from the long side and cut the thick roll into snails. To do this, I recommend using kitchen twine, which you first slide under the roll, then lay over it from the left and right and pull in the opposite direction. This has the advantage (over a knife) that the roll is not compressed, and the snails keep their shape.
Step 3: The toppings
After the snails are baked, you can serve them with the usual sauces as a dip OR drizzle vegan mayo, remoulade, ketchup, mustard or a store-bought hot dog sauce on top.
Well, happy picnic, happy party – and feel free to tell us your favorite hot dog toppings in the comments.
Vegan Hot Dog Buns
Ingredients
For the yeast dough:
- 500 g (4 cups) wheat flour (type 405 or 550)
- 100 g (3.5 oz) roasted onions
- 7 g (1 packet) dry yeast
- 0.5 tsp salt
- 1 tsp sugar
- approx. 275—300 ml (1 — 1.3 cups) lukewarm water
For the topping:
- approx. 400 g (14 oz) vegan sausages
- approx. 200 g (7 oz) gherkins
For the hot dog sauce:
- 100 g (3.5 oz) vegan mayonnaise
- 2 tbsp tomato paste
- 3 tbsp mustard
- approx. 5 g fresh dill
- salt
- pepper
For the topping:
- mustard
- ketchup
- vegan mayonnaise
Instructions
For the yeast dough, put flour, fried onions, dry yeast, salt and sugar in the bowl of a food processor and mix briefly. Then gradually add lukewarm water and knead thoroughly for a few minutes until a wonderfully soft, pliable yeast dough forms.
Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl and let it rise, covered with a damp kitchen towel, for about 1–2 hours at room temperature until it has doubled in volume.
Tip: You can speed up the process by placing the covered bowl on the heater. But then, the kitchen towel must be thoroughly damp so the dough does not dry out on the surface. However, you will get the most beautiful yeast dough if it rises covered and overnight in the refrigerator.
While the dough is resting, slice one or two vegan sausages thinly and set aside for later. Cut the remaining vegan sausages and gherkins into small cubes – feel free to use our photos as a guide, because if the sausages and gherkin pieces are still too big, it will be hard to roll the dough later.
At the same time, for the sauce, mix vegan mayonnaise, tomato paste and mustard. Finally, add freshly chopped dill and season the sauce with salt and pepper.
After resting, place the yeast dough on a floured work surface and roll it out into a large rectangle (about 1 cm thick and 25 cm x 35 cm (9.8 inch x 13.8 inch) wide).
Spread the sauce on the dough, but leave about 1 cm to every edge. Top evenly with the chopped vegan sausages and cucumbers. Then roll up the dough tightly from the long side and divide the dough roll into eight equal pieces. You can do this either with a knife or with kitchen twine, which you slide under the dough and then pull the ends over the dough in the opposite direction each time.
Place the buns in a greased baking dish and tuck the vegan sausage slices you set aside inside from the top. Let them rise again for about 30 minutes.
In the meantime, preheat the oven to 180 °C / 350 ° F (convection heat). Bake the Hot Dog Buns for about 20–25 minutes until golden brown. Then remove from the oven and let cool. Serve with mustard, ketchup and/or vegan mayo.
