Episode 011 Easy Chili for Hot Dogs

Intro: Welcome to Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can get on the table any night of the week. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich. 

Susie Weinrich: All right, I have a confession today. I fully have a secret food love. Do you have any foods that you love that’s like, oh God, do I admit that? I dunno. I super duper love hotdogs, like I really love hot dogs. I don’t know if it’s from my childhood or what it is, but I love a hotdog with a steamed bun and a really good all-beef hotdog that’s garlicy and oh my gosh. They’re so good. I know it’s like bits and pieces, but it doesn’t matter. I don’t know how the sausage is made and I don’t care because I absolutely love it.

If you love hot dogs, stick around today because we’re making a quick stove-top chili to make chili cheese dogs. This recipe is only going to take you about 15 minutes to make. You will definitely have dinner on the table in under 30 minutes. 

Tips and Tricks: Before we get started with the full easy Stovetop chili recipe, I want to talk about heating up your hotdogs. So of course you could grill them, you can poke some holes in them, and pop them in the microwave. But our very favorite way to cook hot dogs is to actually boil them in water. I think that’s how they do it at baseball fields, or if you’ve ever had hot dogs at Costco and they’re not boiled in water, but they’re more steamed. There’s just something about that method that makes your hot dogs super delicious. Fill up a pot of water and just pop all of your hot dogs in and simmer them for 15 minutes while you make this chili.

Chili for Hot Dogs Recipe: To make your quick stove-top chili to make your chili cheese dogs take a large pot and pop it over medium heat. Add about one to two tablespoons of olive oil or vegetable oil. While that heats up, go ahead and dice up one medium-sized white onion. Then pop that in the hot oil and saute it for anywhere from three to five minutes so that it just softens up a bit. Then add one pound of ground beef and crumble it while it cooks through and browns. When the ground beef is fully cooked, go ahead and drain off any grease before you move on to the recipe.

Next, you’re going to pour in a four-ounce can of diced green chilies, and an eight-ounce can of tomato sauce. Then we’re going to measure in some spices. You need one tablespoon of chili powder, two teaspoons of cumin, one teaspoon of sugar, and then one teaspoon each of garlic powder and onion powder. Finish that off with one teaspoon of kosher salt. Give that all a really nice stir and let it simmer together for about two minutes. That’s it. Your chili is now ready, and if you put your hot dogs in the simmering water, your hot dogs are also ready. 

For assembling your chili cheese dogs, I just like to set everything out for people to make their own, because everybody kind of likes their own toppings. Pull your hot dogs out of the water, set the chili out, and then some other additional toppings you might want to have is, of course, cheese, and then maybe some diced white onions, pickled or fresh jalapenos, diced tomatoes, lettuce, of course, mustard, ketchup, mayonnaise, relish, and maybe even some crispy bacon.

For side dishes, I recommend just keeping it pretty simple. Anything that’s a summer barbecue side dish will work here. Chips, french fries, corn on the cob, potato salad, corn salad, coleslaw, and anything like that will pair perfectly with your Chili Cheese Dogs. 

Of course, I will link the full principle recipe in the show notes so you can find it when you’re ready to make your Chili Cheese Dogs.

Outro: That’s it for today. If you are enjoying these episodes of Let’s Make Dinner, I would love it if you would subscribe or follow in your preferred podcast player. Until next time. I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner makes your dinnertime a little easier.

Take me out to the ball game. Take me out to the field, buy me some peanuts and gra good jacks. I don’t care if I have a comeback cause it’s root, root for the home team… because it’s one, two, three strikes you route at the old ball game.