Take this Urban Hot Dog Stand!

We recently moved to Seattle. It's changed the way we eat forever (more on that in posts to come). One thing that I know I've always wanted (but have never enjoyed because I've never lived in a big enough city) is a Hot Dog Stand hot dog.

Seattle is no New York. There are not stands just any place. But the ones we do have are "surf party USA" as Tracy Jordan would say. Off the hook! We really like to stand outside of places like Cha-Cha Lounge and The Unicorn smoking, and dancing to music that is happening inside, but which our claustrophobia prevents us from listening to up close. When we've worked up a serious appetite dancing and watching strangers decked in plastic pants and costume jewelry, we head down to Comet Dog and get a vegetarian dog with cream cheese, thin-cut onions, and all the fixins: ketchup, relish, kraut, mustard. Well, Joey and I have been working on a DIY version of this late-night classic. And we managed to make it with (almost exclusively) locally sourced ingredients. Check it out:

Field Roast Apple-smoked Sage "Sausage" (Seattle)
Buns from Essential Bakery in Fremont
"Olives of Love" from PCC
Local Heirloom Cherry Tomatoes, Onion, Garlic
Some crazy-rind French Goat Cheese
Grace Harbor Farms Cream-top yogurt from Custer, WA
Blackberry Honey from High Country Honey, Burlington, WA

Cayenne Powder, Cumin, salt
First I caramelized some onions in butter. Drizzled a little honey on them (just a touch!) lots of salt, and a little cayenne and cumin. When they were golden with burn-y edges (that's how I like them, although I think the Capitol Hill style is more of an unseasoned, non-crispy thing, and it is also very good).


Then I got started chopping up these olives earl tiny. I put some raw garlic on because the late-night hot dogs are spicy. I chopped the tomatoes up small and put them with the olives. It's a little unconventional as a relish, I can see you right now scratching your chin. But it was actually very good: salty and spicy, exactly what you need to counteract the cream cheese (rather than the cream cheese cutting down the spicy, obvs cream cheese is not negotiable, where spicy certainly is). I see this as a replacement for ketchup (gross) and relish (not gross but difficult to make in 20 minutes before dindin).
Ok so Field Roast Apple Smoke Links are my favorite vegetable-gluten protein of the mo. They are savory like sausage, and a little bit sweet, with a very heady, hearty texture. But there is no meat in them! I think this recipe would also go very well with the other varieties of Links, Chipotle and Italian (although I am not a huge fan of the Italian--too much eggplant).

Then I got some buns toasting.

Then I mixed about a quarter ounce of goat cheese with a half ounce of yogurt until they were fully creamed together. It actually created a dairy product almost the consistency of cream cheese. Maybe you are wondering why we didn't just get cream cheese. Well, the only grocery store we are within walking distance of (at 8 pm when we finally decide to make dinner) is PCC where all the food is super expensive because it's a pretend co-op. Cream cheese costs like $5 there, and I just can't justify that for one meal. Whereas we eat yogurt and goat's cheese separately almost every day. I would say this mixture would be worth trying with Greek yogurt because it is so thick. Cream top yogurt is good, but it is still too thin. Also, because the Grace Harbor Yogurt is made from Guernsey cow's milk, it's a little too sweet to pass as cream cheese. Definitely sour enough and salty enough, though.


Topped all that shit with my salsa-nade and we were ready to eat. It's such a quick meal! If you are fast at chopping olives and cherry tomatoes, which, I am not, because they are very slippery, and as you know, I'm very afraid of sharp objects.