Bacon Wrapped Hot Dogs

Bacon Wrapped Hot Dogs are chewy, crisp, bacon-wrapped, juicy hot dogs and are worth every second of the tiny bit of extra effort they take.

Honestly, it all started with me just playing with my food. I had some packages of not-top-shelf hot dogs I had bought at an irresistible sale price.

I was looking at them and thinking about how I was going to have to bury them in something because I’ve married, given birth to, and raised a bunch of hot dog snobs.

Don’t look at me like that. There IS such a thing as a hot dog snob.

My kids turn their noses up whenever I make anything less than a high-end dog. They prefer Zweigle’s White Hots, Sahlen’s Old-Fashioned Casing Dogs, or something kosher and all-beef.

If they’re at a baseball game, fireman’s carnival or some-such, they’ll happily eat what my husband calls a ‘dirty water dog’, but if we’re home, they want the good stuff. So as I stared at my package of questionable hot dogs, I figured I had to do something to disguise the fact that they weren’t in my guys’ hot-dog wheelhouse.

I grabbed a package of bacon and started wrapping. I wrapped two full packages of hot dogs with bacon and part of a third, reasoning that if they didn’t like the bacon wrapped ones, there would be some plain ones that they could eat even if they weren’t psyched.

I laid the plate on the counter and walked out onto the porch to call the kids to dinner. My eldest had wandered into the kitchen behind me to sniff out what they were going to inhale eat for dinner.

As I took a deep breath iiiiiin to holler for kids who I couldn’t see or hear in the yard I heard my eldest exclaim, “What kind of magic is THIS!?!?” from the kitchen.

It turns out his little brothers had come in through another door, because I heard them all laying tracks to get to the kitchen quickly. Before I could turn around, the rest of them were excitedly shouting, “It’s a miracle!”, “It’s the best thing EVER!”, “OH MOM!”, and “WHOA. Am I seeing this right?”

I was a little, um, surprised by the passion of their reaction. My husband drifted into the kitchen and didn’t even wait for a bun to take a bite of one.

He looked up at me with love in his eyes and said, “This is the best hot dog I’ve ever eaten in my life.” I told them all what brand of hot dog they were eating and every one of them couldn’t possibly have cared less. Behold the power of bacon!

I’m calling that a win even if it WAS just grilled bacon wrapped hot dogs.

Bacon Wrapped Hot Dog

As I mentioned, I made our bacon wrapped hot dog with some hot dogs of questionable quality. When I made it a second time, I used better hot dogs.

While I am, as stated, normally a hot dog snob, any hot dog is going to be just that much better wrapped in bacon. Go ahead and use whichever hot dogs you like best or have handy.

You can opt for either natural casing hot dogs or casing free hot dogs for your bacon wrapped hot dogs. It all comes down to personal preference.

I am going to steer you away from thick-sliced bacon, though, when it comes to choosing which bacon you use to wrap your hot dogs. This is a job for the thin sliced bacon.

Please do not waste thick sliced bacon on your bacon wrapped hot dogs. It won’t cook through and that will make you sad and irritable.

And wonder of wonders, you can make these bacon wrapped hot dogs on the grill, in the oven, or in an air fryer. I’ve got instructions for all three methods built into the printable recipe.

Whichever way you make your bacon wrapped hot dogs, you need to remember that bacon shrinks as it cooks. This is why you’re going to need to fix the bacon onto the hot dog with either toothpicks or skewers.

Metal skewers are the neatest, tidiest, easiest solution if you’re grilling. They have the added bonus of making the hot dogs easier to rotate.

If you’re making your bacon wrapped hot dog in the air fryer or oven, though, you’ll want to opt for toothpicks. If you opt to cook them in the oven or in the air-fryer, you won’t have to rotate them.

Be smart (unlike me the first time I made these) and choose natural toothpicks with no colour (unlike me) to avoid any odd hues spreading onto your bacon and hot dog.

My guys didn’t care, but it offended my aesthetic sensibilities. Yes. I just talked about aesthetic sensibilities combined with hot dogs. I am what I am.

Grilled Hot Dogs Wrapped in Bacon

This really is a simple process, but if you opt for grilling your bacon wrapped hot dogs, it does require you to be present the whole time. There’s no dropping the lid on the grill and walking away for any reason.

Bacon drips fat, and fat on flames flares up. To mitigate any problems, you want to stand by, tongs at the ready.

Don’t feel obliged to keep the hot dogs in the same position on the grill that they were in when you laid them there. If you feel one is cooking faster than the others, move it to a cooler part of the grill.

Conversely, if you have a straggler that’s cooking far slower than the others, swap places on the grill with one that’s been cooking faster. That way you can get them all done at relatively the same time. Move ’em ’round!

Bacon Wrapped Hot Dogs Oven

No grill? No problem.

Bacon wrapped hot dogs oven baked are incredible. They’re also awesome made in the oven. You’ll just need a slightly different methodology for each version.

To cook them in the oven, you’ll take your skewered or tooth-pick secured bacon wrapped hot dogs and arrange them on a cooling rack or roasting rack set over a rimmed baking sheet. Pop the whole assembly into the hot oven and roast until the bacon is as crispy as you like it!

No need to worry about the hot dog at that point. Whenever your bacon is done, so, too, will be your hot dog.

As for the air-fryer, this might be my favourite method when making these. The only downside of this is that you can’t do quite as many at once.

In my beloved extra-large capacity air-fryer, I can comfortably fit 6 to 8 bacon wrapped hot dogs. That’s plenty when it’s just my husband and me and one kid. When more than one of the boys are home, though, that just doesn’t cut it.

My kids ate these straight-up, old-school hot dog style with ketchup, mustard, and relish. My husband and I ate them smothered in mango salsa, pickled onions, and lettuce and hot sauce.

Of course, you can top these any old which way you wish, but some great options are Candied Jalapenos, Grilled Pineappple Relish, Pickle de Gallo, Quick Pickled Red Onions, and yes, even Pickled Brussels Sprouts! I’m also pretty keen on Sweet and Spicy Cranberry Sauce on these dogs!

Bacon Wrapped Hot Dogs

Wrap a piece of bacon around each hot dog, starting at one end, fixing it in place with a toothpick skewered all the way through the bacon and hot dog. Spiral it around the hot dog to the other end where another toothpick is pushed through to hold it in place.

You could also wrap the hot dog in bacon and use a skewer pushed from one end of the hot dog to the other to fix the bacon in place. Repeat until all the hot dogs are wrapped in bacon.

On The Grill

Preheat grill to low (or build a low bed of coals on one side of the grill).

Place the hot dogs on the hot, clean grill and let them cooking, turning and repositioning as necessary, until the bacon is chewy/crisp, or about 8 minutes.

In the Air-Fryer

Preheat your air fryer to 400ºF.

Arrange the bacon wrapped hot dogs in your air fryer, leaving space between them. Air-fry for 8-10 minutes, or until the bacon is as chewy and/or crispy as you’d like it.

In the Oven

Preheat your oven to 400ºF. Arrange your bacon wrapped hot dogs on a metal cooling rack set over a rimmed half sheet pan.

Slide the whole works into the oven and oven roast for 14 to 20 minutes, or until the bacon is as chewy or crisp as you desire.

This post was originally published June 27, 2014 and was republished April 28, 2022 with air-fryer and oven instructions and new photos.