Thai Dog

In another of my series of culturally inspired hot dogs,  I decided to do a Thai style dog which is not only a little spicy, but has most of the rich flavors associated with Thai food.

As is normally the case with these hot dogs, this is a compound dog which involves preparation of another dish prior to the assembly of the dog. In this case, you will need to make Larb, and this link will take you to my recipe for it. Make it ahead of time, so it is ready to go when you make the dogs.

Ingredients

• poultry hot dog or sausage(mild)
• potato hot dog bun
• Larb
• Thai red curry paste
• 1 can of coconut milk
• 1 bunch of cilantro (or leftover cilantro from making the larb)
• 1 cup whole basil leaves
• 1 tablespoon chopped basil
• 2 tablespoons butter

Take the chopped basil and add it to the softened butter to form a compound butter. Butter the inside of the hot dog buns with the basil butter. and then toast them until lightly brown.

Next, grill the hot dogs or sausages. I used pretty standard turkey hot dogs. Do not worry about the blandness of the dog – we will be spicing it up just fine. Grill the dogs until there are nice and brown on the outside. Remove them from the grill.

In a pan, add about 1 tablespoon of the Thai red curry paste and about 1/2 the can of coconut milk. Blend together completely over medium heat. When combined, add the hot dogs and saute them gently, allowing the flavors of the curry to cook into the dogs.

Place the dog on the toasted bun along with about 1 teaspoon of the curry suace. Then add about 1/3 cup of the larb to top the dog. Over the top of that, add fresh basil leaves and cilantro and the dog is complete.

I served mine with nori sushi, since you should have some rice with any Asian meal, though I supposed cripy fries would work as well !