The Hirshon Colombian Hot Dogs – Perro Caliente Colombiano

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Colombian Hot Dog Image Used Under Creative Commons License From mycolombianrecipes.com

Citizens, many of you are familiar with the glorious hot dogs that we have featured in the past here on TFD: the Coney Island dog and the Chicago dog. However, you are probably not familiar with the awesome grandeur that is the Colombian Hot Dog or Perro Caliente Colombiano!

This classic Colombian street food is a truly impressive (and to the uninitiated, truly bizarre) hot dog, boiled in a combo of Coca-Cola and water and topped with a pineapple sauce, garlic mayonnaise, mustard, a pink sauce, a green sauce, cole slaw and crushed potato chips!

Quite the combo – and quite delicious, once you get past its forbidding-looking toppings!

In case you are unaware: the proud country of Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is situated in the northwest of South America, bordered to the northwest by Panama; to the east by Venezuela and Brazil and to the south by Ecuador and Peru. It also shares maritime limits with Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Jamaica, Dominican Republic and Haiti.

The territory of what is now Colombia was originally inhabited by indigenous peoples including the Muisca, Quimbaya, and Tairona. The Spanish arrived in 1499 and initiated a period of conquest and colonization ultimately creating the Viceroyalty of New Granada, with its capital at Bogotá.

Independence from Spain was won in 1819, but by 1830 “Gran Colombia” had collapsed with the secession of Venezuela and Ecuador. What is now Colombia and Panama emerged as the Republic of New Granada. The new nation experimented with federalism as the Granadine Confederation (1858), and then the United States of Colombia (1863), before the Republic of Colombia was finally declared in 1886. Panama seceded in 1903.

Since the 1960s, the country has suffered from an asymmetric low-intensity armed conflict, which escalated in the 1990s, but then decreased from 2005 onward.

Colombia is ethnically diverse, its people descending from the original native inhabitants, Spanish colonists, Africans originally brought to the country as slaves, and 20th-century immigrants from Europe and the Middle East, all contributing to a diverse cultural heritage.

This has also been influenced by Colombia’s varied geography, and the imposing landscape of the country has resulted in the development of very strong regional identities. The majority of the urban centers are located in the highlands of the Andes mountains, but Colombian territory also encompasses Amazon rainforest, tropical grassland and both Caribbean and Pacific coastlines.

Colombia’s varied cuisine is influenced by its diverse fauna and flora as well as the cultural traditions of the ethnic groups. Colombian dishes and ingredients vary widely by region.

Some of the most common ingredients are: cereals such as rice and maize; tubers such as potato and cassava; assorted legumes; meats, including beef, chicken, pork and goat; fish; and seafood. Colombia cuisine also features a variety of tropical fruits such as cape gooseberry, feijoa, arazá, dragon fruit, mangostino, granadilla, papaya, guava, mora (blackberry), lulo, soursop and passionfruit.

In Colombia, perros calientes are sold in street stands with ketchup, mustard, salsa rosada, mayonnaise, pineapple sauce, (sometimes) cheese and crumbled potato chips. Some add a cooked quail’s egg on top. In the coast, it’s common to also add some finely shredded lettuce to the bun, giving it a refreshing touch for the coast’s hot weather.

New York’s Jackson Heights area in Queens is one of the most Hispanic neighborhoods in America, with a population that’s nearly 60 percent Latino. In fact, you can take yourself on a Latino hot dog tour if you just walk down the city’s main drag, Northern Boulevard, as noted in this excellent article. http://www.seriouseats.com/2010/02/colombian-hot-dogs-perro-caliente-queens-jackson-heights-nyc.html

Citizens, put aside your skepticism – you must try this unique hot dog for yourselves! I’ve made a few tweaks to the recipe, including using roasted garlic in the garlic mayo and discarding the cheese – feel free to grate some on your version of the recipe if you so prefer.

Battle on – The Generalissimo

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Pineapple Sauce (About 1 Cup)

2 cups fresh pineapple, peeled and cut into chunks
1/3 cup water
2 ½ tablespoons sugar or taste
1 ¼ teaspoon cornstarch
Juice of ½ a lime

6 hot dogs buns
6 all-beef hot dogs with casings (I am partial to Olympia Provisions brand)
1 ½ cups Coca-Cola, mixed with 1 ½ cups of water to boil the hot dogs

1 cup pineapple sauce
1 cup cole slaw
1 small bag potato chips, crushed into fine pieces

For the Roasted Garlic Mayo:

½ cup Best Foods or Hellman’s mayonnaise
1 tsp freshly-ground cumin
1 clove of roasted garlic, mashed to a paste with salt and pepper (this is a TFD affectation, albeit a delicious one. Use a raw garlic clove to go traditional)

For the salsa verde (green sauce):

½ cup Best Foods or Hellman’s mayonnaise
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
½ cup minced Cilantro
Salt, to taste

For the salsa rosada (pink sauce):

½ cup Best Foods or Hellman’s mayonnaise
¼ cup Organic Tomato Sauce (Muir Glen preferred)
Salt and pepper to taste

Mustard

Cooked Quail Eggs (optional but strongly recommended – you can buy them canned at most Asian markets or fresh on Amazon here)

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For the Pineapple sauce:

Put the pineapple and water in a blender and blend until smooth.

Press the pineapple mixture through a sieve into a small saucepan. Discard the pineapple on the sieve.

Place the saucepan with the pineapple mixture over medium-low heat and add the lime juice and sugar. Cook, stirring for about 15 minutes.

In a small bowl blend the cornstarch with 1 tablespoon of water and then stir the mixture into the pineapple sauce.

Bring slowly to a boil, stirring until the sauce thickens. Simmer gently for 4 minutes while stirring.

Let it cool and transfer to a serving bowl.

Blend the roasted garlic mayo, pink and green sauce ingredients together and reserve in separate bowls.

In a medium pot bring Coca-Cola and water mixture to a boil, ideally in a pyrex or porcelain-lined pot (the acid in the cola is not good for metal!).

Add the hot dogs to the boiling liquid and cover. Cook 7 minutes.

Remove and drain on paper towels.

Place the hot dogs in the buns and top with pineapple sauce, coleslaw, the two sauces and mustard, topped with crushed potato chips and a hard-boiled quail egg, if using. Serve and enjoy!