Hot Dog Cookies

Summer is finally here!  Yeah!  Barbecues, strolling along the beach, sitting on a chair outside and reading a good book, drinking ice cold lemonade, and eating hamburgers on the grill are just some of the things I love about summer.  I live in New England so I am lucky to experience all of the seasons in their full glory, and love each season for its special qualities, but summer is, of course, my favorite.  Certain foods go with summer for sure...potato salad, pasta salad, grilled food, corn on the cob, strawberry shortcake, and of course hamburgers and hot dogs.  Now, I must confess; I am not a huge fan of hot dogs.  I stopped liking hot dogs when I was around 12 and had just heard of some of the possible ingredients that might be in hot dogs.  When you are young there is always that one kid who loves telling all of the other kids things they don't know, proudly proclaiming..."hey, you know what that is made out of?"  or  "hey, do you know where that comes from?"  Well, I know they say hot dogs are usually made out of decent things now, but once the seed is implanted in my mind there is no going back.  I haven't touched a hot dog since that day when some kid filled me in on the gory details.

I will eat these adorable hot dogs, though.  They are cookies of course.  Years ago, I bought a cook book called Just For Kids.  It is filled with recipes to make for and with kids.  I have really enjoyed this book and made many of the recipes in it.  This is one of my favorites.  Not only are the cookies cute, but they are really good tasting too and fun to make.

One thing I would  like to mention before you make these is the batter does not make a lot of cookies.  I got 17 cookies.  The original recipe called for six cookies.  Six cookies!  I mean what are you going to do with six cookies.  My son would inhale those in about two seconds.  So I made the cookies smaller but still only got 17.  So if you are making them for a crowd, you might want to double the batch.  Also the dough needs to be refrigerated for four hours before you shape and bake the cookies.  So allow time to prepare them.

To make the cookies, place butter, sugar, brown sugar, and one egg yolk in a mixing bowl.  Mix well.

  In a separate bowl, mix flour, baking powder, and salt.  Mix well. 

 Cover and refrigerate for four hours.


When dough is ready, remove 1/3 of the dough from the bowl.  Place remaining dough back in refrigerator.  Place the 1/3 of the dough in a mixing bowl and add about 40 drops of red food coloring and 5 drops of green.  Mix well.  Add more food coloring as necessary until you get the dough to look the color of a hot dog (reddish brown). 

Not pretty at this stage.

Place a sheet of wax paper on your counter to work on.  Break off one inch pieces of the dough and roll into thin logs shaped like little hot dogs.  Round the edges with your fingers.  No need to add extra flour when shaping the dough.  It is a very easy dough to work with.  Roll the hot dogs out to about 2 inches.  You can make them smaller if you want more cookies.  They will puff
up a little in the oven.

Remove remaining dough from refrigerator.  Lay a sheet of wax paper on your counter to work on.   Break of 1 1/2 inch pieces.  Roll into thick logs, making them slightly longer than the hot dogs, about 2 1/2 inches long.  Make an indentation in the center of each log to make it look like a bun.  Shape them with your fingers as needed to look like buns.  Press sesame seeds on the sides of the buns. 

Lift the buns with a spatula and place on greased cookie sheets.  Place the hot dogs on top of the buns.  Place in the freezer for 20 minutes. 

 Remove from freezer and bake for 17 to 20 minutes or until edges are light golden brown.  Cool completely on cooling racks.

To decorate, use white frosting colored with yellow for mustard and red for ketchup.  Use flaked coconut that has been chopped up finely and colored with green food coloring to look like relish.  You can also use white or clear gummy candies to look like onions. 

Hot Dog Cookies (Just For Kids cookbook)

3/4 Cup butter, softened
1/4 Cup granulated sugar
1/4 Cup brown sugar
1 Egg yolk
1 3/4 Cups of flour
3/4 Teaspoon of baking powder
1/8 Teaspoon salt
1 Can of white frosting or homemade butter cream frosting for decorating.
Food coloring
Flaked  sweetened coconut, chopped finely, for decorating
Sesame seeds for decorating

****Note allow plenty of time to prepare these because the dough needs to be refrigerated for four hours*****

Combine butter, sugar, brown sugar, and egg yolk in a mixing bowl.  Mix well.  In a separate bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, and salt.  Mix well.  Cover and refrigerate for four hours.

When dough is ready, preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Remove 1/3 of the dough from bowl.  Place remaining dough back in refrigerator.   Place the 1/3 of the dough in a mixing bowl and mix together with about 40 drops of red and 5 drops of green food coloring until it is the color of a hot dog (reddish brown).  Lay a sheet of wax paper on your counter to work on.  Take one inch pieces from the dough and roll into thin longs about 2 inches long, shaping them to look like hot dogs, rounding the edges.  Set aside.  Lay a second piece of wax paper on your counter to work with the white dough.  Take remaining dough and separate it into the same amount of pieces as you have made the hot dogs.  For example, I got 17 hot dogs; so I separated the white dough into 17 pieces.  Roll the white pieces into thick logs, slightly bigger than you made the hot dogs, about 2 1/2 inches.  Make an indentation in the center of each one.  Shape to look like hot dog buns.  Press sesame seeds into the sides of the buns.  Grease two or more cookie sheets.  Use a spatula to place the buns on the cookie sheets.  Gently place the hot dogs on the buns.  Place in freezer and freeze for 20 minutes.  When ready, bake for 17 to 20 minutes until the edges are lightly golden brown. 

To decorate, tint some frosting yellow and some red for mustard and ketchup.  Tint some coconut green to look like relish and stick on cookie using frosting. 

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