The Dog House

Hot Dog Buns

This is a fantastic recipe for making homemade hot dog buns using your bread machine. Sure beats stale store-bought buns! Takes about two hours to make from beginning of dough cycle to end of baking time.

Add the following ingredients in this order to your bread machine:

1½ cups warm water
2 tbsp. vegetable oil
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 egg
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tbsp. salt
3 tbsp. sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tbsp. active dry yeast

Note that the flour is added in three increments--this breaks up the other ingredients so they won't interact with each other before the bread machine starts. Set your bread machine to the "dough" cycle. Add more time if you need the dough to finish at a later time.

When the dough cycle ends, dump the dough out onto a greased baking or cookie sheet. Divide the dough into 12 equal-sized balls. Stretch each ball out into a hot dog bun shape. Don't worry if the dough is a bit flat or narrow--it will continue to rise a while longer.

Cover the baking sheet with a clean, dry towel and allow the dough to rise for another half hour or so. Preheat the oven to 400°F/200°C/Gas 6.

Bake the buns for about 15 to 20 minutes. Keep an eye on them--they can burn easily! Immediately remove buns from hot baking sheet when done and wrap in clean, dry towels until ready to use. (The towels will keep the buns soft.) Then slice each bun lenghwise, add hot dog and garnish, and enjoy!