I Recreated LA’s “Illegal” 2 AM Hot Dog

[00:00] I will never forget the moment I was

[00:01] introduced to LA's most dangerous hot

[00:04] dog. Let me paint you a picture. You're

[00:06] in LA, it's 2:00 a.m. You had a few,

[00:09] three, four, five martinis, and the bars

[00:12] are closing, and nothing is open. As

[00:14] you're leaving, a crowd starts forming

[00:16] around a Mexican lady equipped with the

[00:18] most interesting and questionable

[00:20] cooking rig you've ever seen. A small

[00:23] pushcart topped with a sheet tray filled

[00:26] to the brim with bacon-wrapped hot dogs,

[00:28] onions, and peppers, jalapenos,

[00:30] all powered by one single heat source, a

[00:33] Sterno. And while there are some

[00:35] questionable practices associated

[00:37] historically with the [music] LA danger

[00:39] dog, it is the iconic, undisputed

[00:42] late-night food of LA. And while there

[00:44] are operations all over the city, there

[00:46] is one guy that I am particularly

[00:49] obsessed with.

[00:51] Today, I take inspiration from him.

[00:53] >> You are not him. You are not him.

[00:55] >> This is the LA danger dog, and I assure

[00:58] you it's safer than you think.

[01:01] Now, the basis for our recipe is hot

[01:04] dogs and bacon [music] to make our

[01:06] bacon-wrapped hot dogs. Now, I'm a New

[01:09] Yorker, we're going with Sabrett. This

[01:11] is the undisputed New York hot dog, in

[01:13] my opinion. It's the one found on every

[01:15] cart on every corner in New York.

[01:17] Probably not what they use, but the hot

[01:19] dog itself doesn't really matter. I'm

[01:21] just going to get them out of their

[01:22] package and dry them a little bit. For

[01:24] the bacon, we want to lean on the

[01:26] thinner side. Otherwise, too thick,

[01:29] you're not going to re- render that

[01:30] bacon out the same time of the hot dog

[01:32] cooking. And so, what we're going to do

[01:34] is we're just going to start like this.

[01:35] I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to

[01:37] wrap that bacon around the hot dog. Now,

[01:40] why the name danger? If you know

[01:42] anything about food service, or if

[01:43] you've ever worked in food service, is

[01:45] that when you work with food, you must

[01:48] keep that food either below 40° or above

[01:51] 140°.

[01:53] Anything in between, referred to as the

[01:55] danger zone. And while there was a time

[01:57] when this was highly suspect, this is

[01:59] now actually been legitimized and

[02:01] recognized as a legitimate food option

[02:04] on the streets. And the original

[02:06] Martinez is one of the most popular. But

[02:08] I don't know what it is about this guy.

[02:12] >> [screaming]

[02:13] >> He's kind of a vibe.

[02:17] And I'm a sucker for the theatrics, and

[02:20] this guy knows how to bring the

[02:21] theatrics.

[02:25] This is going to go into the fridge,

[02:27] where it's below 40°, we're going to

[02:29] allow that bacon to kind of firm up and

[02:30] wrap tightly around those hot dogs. Next

[02:33] up, onions and peppers. For the onion,

[02:35] we're just going to take the top, take

[02:37] the bottom off, cut it in half, get

[02:39] those skins off. Now to cut this onion,

[02:42] you can cut it two ways. Orbitally,

[02:43] which is cutting along the lines that

[02:46] run across the surface, or you can cut

[02:48] it across. This way, it's going to cut

[02:52] more of the fibers of the onion, so this

[02:54] will break down more tender, more

[02:56] buttery after cooking. If we cut along

[03:00] the sides, we got less cells cut through

[03:02] in the onion,

[03:03] >> [music]

[03:03] >> so while it'll cook down and soften,

[03:05] it's going to still have a little bit

[03:06] more texture. I want a little texture,

[03:08] so I'm going to cut orbitally along

[03:10] those lines. Not paper thin, but we want

[03:13] them on the thinner side. Make our way

[03:15] across until we no longer have stability

[03:19] in the onion, and then we're just going

[03:20] to push it over, do the same thing.

[03:25] Next up, we've got some red bell

[03:26] peppers. We're just going to slice the

[03:28] cheeks around the pepper, not

[03:30] lengthwise. We're going to turn [music]

[03:31] it,

[03:32] and we're going to cut strips.

[03:38] >> [music]

[03:38] >> Our veg is ready. The last thing to

[03:40] prep,

[03:42] flaming hot Cheetos, bro. This is

[03:44] Martinez's sort of signature move. And

[03:46] while I'm not a flaming hot Cheeto guy

[03:48] myself, there's a time and a place for

[03:50] everything. Bag of flaming Hot Cheetos

[03:52] into a food processor.

[03:54] We're just going to process it into like

[03:56] a dust.

[03:58] Just going to get it in here so I can

[04:00] transfer it into my retrofitted

[04:02] dispenser. Now, I'm not saying this to

[04:05] brag, I have made ravioli dough out of

[04:08] Flaming Hot Cheetos. So, they are while

[04:10] a versatile cooking tool, you don't you

[04:13] don't need it every day. Then we've got

[04:15] our jalapenos, which we're going to just

[04:17] stir up with our veg. We've got our

[04:18] sauces. We're going to take some

[04:21] creative liberties here. We've got our

[04:22] regular ketchup, mayonnaise, mustard. I

[04:25] love Sriracha on a hot dog. So, I'm

[04:27] going to add a little bit of that. Also

[04:29] going to with our veg going to add some

[04:30] cherry peppers. And then of course, the

[04:33] sturdiest bun for something like this in

[04:35] my opinion that I can find, Martin's hot

[04:37] dog rolls. Now, you know I like to

[04:39] recreate things true to form,

[04:41] authentically. And like I said, we're

[04:43] not setting up a pushcart with a sheet

[04:45] tray, but we're going to try and make

[04:46] this very much in the spirit of the

[04:48] Martinez LA dog. Now, while we will not

[04:51] be using a sheet tray to cook these, I

[04:54] am going to need a flat top style

[04:57] griddle to cook our danger dogs. So, I'm

[04:59] going to need our carbon steel griddle

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[05:38] it so much is because it covers two

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[05:57] it's time to make LA danger dogs. Now as

[05:59] far as setup goes, if you pay close

[06:02] attention to the actual sheet tray

[06:04] cooking surface, you'll notice a warped

[06:07] dimple at the center where the heat

[06:09] source sits. That's the hot spot and

[06:11] that's where all the fat pools and where

[06:13] everything cooks. With our griddle,

[06:15] we're going to do similar thing. I'm

[06:17] going to have the hot spot be here and

[06:19] turn the front burner on. The back's

[06:21] going to stay warm and I can push

[06:23] everything off to the back and just cook

[06:25] everything sort of right here. While

[06:27] that's slowly heating up, so we can

[06:30] render our bacon nicely, going to place

[06:32] seam side down. Keep that bacon nice and

[06:34] secured right on the griddle.

[06:38] >> [music]

[06:39] >> Then I'm going to place my press on them

[06:40] just to make sure that we keep that

[06:42] bacon nice and sealed and secured to the

[06:45] hot dogs. We're just going to cook these

[06:47] slowly allowing the bacon fat to render.

[06:50] You don't want to cook them too fast,

[06:52] too hard. [music] If it was just hot

[06:53] dogs, it'd be different, but now we're

[06:55] trying to render that fat not only to

[06:57] get the bacon crispy around the hot dog,

[07:01] but to give us a cooking fat to [music]

[07:03] cook the rest of our vegetables with.

[07:05] After about 5 or 6 minutes, once you can

[07:07] tell starting to brown on that first

[07:11] side, but the bacon still holding

[07:12] together, you can rotate them.

[07:14] >> [music]

[07:16] >> And the trick that I found to prevent it

[07:18] from unraveling around the hot dog is

[07:20] not too hot of a temperature to start.

[07:25] Once they start browning and we get

[07:27] close, we're really just turning them

[07:29] and ensuring there is no unrendered fat

[07:31] [music] in the bacon.

[07:34] That's starting to look like what you

[07:36] want to see. Golden brown all over the

[07:38] surface.

[07:42] And you see how the bacon has completely

[07:44] browned. There's no visible white fat

[07:47] present any longer. You've just got

[07:49] crisp bacon wrapping around hot dog. As

[07:52] they sort of finish, we can transfer

[07:54] them back to the holding position.

[07:57] We can get our jalapenos on and you'll

[08:00] notice we have all of this bacon fat and

[08:02] that's what why we cook this first. We

[08:05] want that bacon fat for our vegetables.

[08:07] And you see the jalapenos start

[08:09] blistering. Let's just keep rotating

[08:11] them and I think our dogs are just about

[08:13] done.

[08:14] Now, where we cooked our hot dogs, in

[08:16] with the onions. [music]

[08:18] And now we're cooking like Martinez.

[08:21] Love it. All the bacon fat, all the

[08:24] little bacon bits will be picked up by

[08:27] the moisture of the onions.

[08:29] >> [music]

[08:32] >> After a minute or two, when we've

[08:34] started to get a little bit of color and

[08:36] those onions softening,

[08:38] then we go on with our peppers.

[08:41] Salt as well. Now we're just looking to

[08:43] get a little color, a little char,

[08:44] soften all the vegetables

[08:46] >> [music]

[08:46] >> and we're almost there. Once our

[08:49] jalapenos are roasted, we can kind of

[08:51] keep them warm in the back. We got a

[08:52] little aluminum foil tin here. Now we

[08:55] can start to combine it all.

[08:57] >> [music]

[08:59] >> Finally, in with our cherry peppers.

[09:02] >> [music]

[09:03] >> All those vegetables, the acidity of the

[09:05] cherry peppers, everything cooking in

[09:08] that bacon fat has such an incredible

[09:10] aroma.

[09:12] Once our onions are cooked, we can

[09:13] transfer them to our little tray, keep

[09:16] them warm and then go over to our

[09:19] serving station.

[09:22] Now we're ready for service. I got my

[09:24] real cam. [music] Two with everything?

[09:26] You got it. Just let the buns touch.

[09:29] Give it a gentle warm, barely any heat.

[09:34] Mayonnaise, ketchup, mustard, a little

[09:38] Sriracha. Flaming hot Cheetos, bro?

[09:41] Cebollitas.

[09:44] Jalapeno.

[09:45] There you have an LA danger dog.

[09:49] But actually, this is how I prefer to

[09:51] serve it.

[09:52] >> [music]

[09:52] >> The Martinez sauce drizzle is much

[09:54] harder than it looks. I don't even know

[09:56] how he does it. So, this is how we're

[09:57] going to do it.

[09:59] >> [music]

[10:01] >> Sick, bro.

[10:04] There's so much good stuff going on in

[10:05] here. That's a complete meal. It tastes

[10:08] as good as it looks. And if you want to

[10:09] throw together an LA dog set up at your

[10:12] house, recipe's going to be down in the

[10:14] description. That's all that I have

[10:16] today. I'll see you next time. Until

[10:17] then, take care of yourself, stay safe,

[10:20] and go feed yourself.