The Mythical Kitchen Hot Dog Innovation That Made The LA Big Leagues

One of the best things about hot dogs is their versatility. You can get as creative as you want with combining tasty toppings, using flavorful condiments, and even choosing how to cook them to bring out that bold, sought-after smoky flavor. The chefs at Mythical Kitchen are no stranger to this type of unique flavor experimentation, so you can bet they got rather inventive during their own hot dog-making challenge on YouTube. In one video, Josh Scherer, the face of the channel and self-dubbed "food guy," and his fellow chef and teammate, Lily, ended up creating the winning hot dog using savory birria de res.

Hailing from Jalisco, Mexico, birria is traditionally prepared with goat meat and eaten at special occasions or as a trusty hangover cure. In recent years, the juicy dish has surged in popularity in the U.S. in the form of tacos, where it is generally eaten with meats like beef, chicken, and pork. The meat is slow-cooked in a stew filled with onion, garlic, and zesty chiles before being served with cilantro and a side of even more spiced broth (consomé) for dipping purposes. Turning this cultural masterpiece into a hot dog was a timely choice on Mythical Kitchen's part.

Team Scherer's winning hot dog was introduced to the foodies of downtown Los Angeles in the form of a pop-up restaurant at the country's biggest weekly outdoor food market, Smorgasburg. It only stuck around for a day, but thankfully, you can recreate this original hot dog in all its glory.

When mixing your own adobo, the spices are essential. In Mythical Kitchen's video, we can see Lily tossing large chiles into a blender to create the birria's base. Those chiles are guajillo, ancho, and arbol, and their flavors are best brought to life by first heating the chiles on the stove before immersing them in hot water with added spices for about 15 minutes. Once rehydrated, the paste is buzzed in a blender along with vinegar, oregano, thyme, cloves, and salt and pepper. Scherer likes to toss a cinnamon stick in to give the adobo yet another delicious layer of flavor. They used beef in their birria de res recipe, which simmers in the blended adobo paste.

These Mythical chefs make it look easy as they tag team this idea, making quick work of grilling the hot dogs while creating their own jalapeño mustard as the meat finishes soaking up flavor. The meat will be pretty juicy, but you can drop it right onto the griddle with a layer of crumbly cheese on top. "This is going to be the wettest hot dog anyone's ever had," Scherer announces before putting the dogs onto the cheesy birria, carefully securing upside down buns on each to steam. Flip each one right side-up, drizzle on even more adobo, and top with cilantro and spicy mustard to serve. It's easy to see why this hybrid hot dog was the pick for a market like Smorgasburg, known for vendors serving social media-friendly foods like rainbow bao, loaded fries, and fish-shaped taiyaki.