Happy Wiener Wednesday!
This week I’m taking a stab at Frankfurter Cheese Boats!
I chose this recipe because the ad promises me “a boat load of good eating!”
“Hot Dog,” you’ll say, “I’m glad we made ’em with Kaukauna Klub”
To bring you distinctively flavored Kaukauna Klub, we take the finest of natural cheddar cheese and age it carefully to it peak of flavor. then this subtle natural flavor is captured and brought to you in convenient links and crocks through an exclusive, family guarded secret of cold packing. Why not taste for yourself what Kaukauna Klub does for the popular Frank?
Picture it–Wisconsin, 1918.
A dude named Hubert Fassbender founded South Kaukauna Dairy. He perfected what is called “cold pack” cheese– grinding cheese and, without heat, combining it with whey solids, dry milk, and flavors such as wine and spices. This is so it can spread at room temp.
His cheese was served in hotels and clubs in the area and acquired the nickname “club cheese.” The Kaukauna Klub brand was introduced and copyrighted in 1933.
The Klub was dropped somewhere along the way, but they are the nation’s largest manufacturer of cheese balls and cheese logs, which I’m sure you’ve seen in stores.
C’mon! It ain’t a party until a nut-covered port wine cheese ball arrives!
The port wine cheese ball is an item that, as a child, I found terribly elegant and very grown up. Alas, I can’t have port wine cheese in the house because much like marshmallow fluff, it will disappear in a disgustingly short amount of time.
But let’s get to the boats.
A boatload of good eating!
Slit a pocket in each frankfurter. Insert “sails” made of Sharp American Flavor Kaukauna Klub cut in half circles. Wrap in slice of partially broiled bacon, place in bun and broil!
But the first hurdle in making these cheese boats was the cheese itself. They no longer make Kaukauna Klub cheese in links. So how the hell am I going to get “sails” out of this little tub of cheese?
I tried to shimmy the cheese out of the tub, but not all of it cooperated. So I ended up with cheese blob.
I then attempted to make the “sails” for the boat. I put the cheese blob into the freezer for a bit to harden it up.
This semi-worked and I was able to get something that resembled triangles.
Surprisingly, my Frankfurter Cheese Boats looked extremely similar to the actual ad!
I don’t know how long I put them in the broiler. I guess long enough for the bacon to cook and the bun to burn.
There you have it! The Frankfurter Cheese Boat!
Was this a “boatload of good eating?” Am I glad that I made em’ with Kaukauna Klub?
Sure. Whatever. I mean, it’s a cheese-bacon dog. That’s not a bad thing–but a variation of this has been featured as a Wednesday Wiener a couple of times already.
But why boats? Why sails? They don’t maintain their structural integrity. They just melt away in the broiler.
You’re better off stuffing the cheese into the dog before wrapping it in bacon.
I promise that next week we are going to wrap up Wiener Wednesdays 2022 with a humdinger of a dish. It has SURPRISE in its name!
On a totally unrelated (kind of) topic, what’s your take on the ice cream “hot dogs” recipe (p. 58, iirc) in the current issue (July/Aug) of the Food Network Magazine? (It’s on their website if you don’t get the ‘zine.) It’s a dessert, but . . . some things just defy logic.
I would eat this. I also feel that no party is truly complete without a cheeseball.
That recipe reminds me of how I used to eat hot dogs as a kid. I’d cut a pocket and stuff it full of rectangles of whatever cheese we had (usually Colby). I certainly wouldn’t have minded the addition of bacon, either. I am a condiment-o-phobe, so this would have been perfect! (And I do enjoy Kaukauna cheese balls every Christmas at my in-laws’ place.)
I never appreciated how excellent the Kaukauna Klub port wine cheese spread was until I compared it to the monumentally worse WisPride version. The port wine is the best, but all the Kaukauna spreads were pretty good (at least back in the day, when I used to eat them; unfortunately, I have occasionally learned that once-magnificent brands have turned to crap over the years), although I don’t remember ever consuming an “appetizer”-flavored variety.
Weirdly, despite having grown up in Wisconsin, Kaukauna cheese balls were never a part of my childhood – I’ve always looked at them in the grocery store with a mix of fear and suspicion. 😂 This looks like it was a fun recipe to make, though, even if it was a little humdrum in execution!
Perfect timing — today is National Hot Dog Day!
A Kaukauna Klub cheese ball was present at every party my parents ever threw and I have kept the tradition going. If it was just us, the crocks and later cups were good enough. It’s really good on a Triscuit, but then what isn’t, right? I even have a “chip and dip” contraption that, while too small to contain enough onion dip for the evening, fits the cheeseball and Triscuits perfectly. (I may or may not have eaten the stuff out of the cup with a spoon.)
I am guilty of eating it straight out of the cup. And, yes, triscuits are the best pairing.