Oscar Mayer Stuffed Dogs review: The new hot dog line will leave you, well, stuffed

If you have ever wished you were an Oscar Mayer weiner, I have great news for you: now, just like you, their hot dogs are stuffed with cheese. Or rather, their new Stuffed Dogs line, which includes three flavors – Cheese, Chili Cheese, and Jalapeño Cheddar – infuse the classic dogs with chunks of cheese and other flavors.

The idea is to evoke popular hot dog toppings at restaurants, at home. And beyond that, the brand is pretty open about the fact that the “cheese-stuffed hot dog” sector of the market is growing much faster than the “non-cheese stuffed hot dog” sector of the market. They introduced the cheese dogs a while back, and are now expanding their line with those two additional flavors.

Based on samples of these three flavors provided by Oscar Mayer to Guilty Eats for review, while they won’t replace the basic hot dog in my book (bun?) any time soon, they are a surprisingly fun and tasty lunch, or barbecue addition for the summer.

Let’s start with the basic Cheese Stuffed Dog. This is the size of a regular hot dog, and comes 10 to a pack. Unlike the others (we’ll get to this in a second) the Cheese Stuffed Dogs recommend you either boil them, or cook in a microwave. Obviously do whatever you want, but I will say that when I went rogue and cooked this in a pan I immediately regretted it. The cheese oozed out of the chunks that were closer to the surface and burned in the pan, and generally it looked like a charred finger. Later, I cooked them in the microwave and not only were they visually more appealing, but they didn’t, you know, taste bad. I guess the folks who put together the label knew what they were talking about?

Taste-wise (when you’re making it correctly) these are okay… You do get a little gush of cheese every once in a while, but frankly (no frankfurter pun intended) I would rather put cheese sauce on the dog, than in it. The texture of a hot dog is important: it needs that snap on the outside, a good bite on the inside. The cheese interrupts that, and generally changes the feeling of eating the dog.

Moving to the two new flavors, these do suggest either microwaving or cooking them on the stove or grill. They’re also larger than the Cheese Dog, albeit not quite as girthy as a sausage, and come eight to a package. You know, the same amount as the number of buns you can buy? On that fact alone, these dogs are heads and tails (no pun intended on the heads and tails they use to make hot dogs) above the basic Oscar Mayer hot dog.

They’re also, perhaps because of the width, much juicer than the Cheese Dog. They’ve got a nice amount of flavor to both varieties, which doesn’t taste artificial in any way. And in fact, the Jalapeño has small bits of the pepper baked into the hot dog, giving it a nice but not overwhelming kick.

While two members of my tasting party preferred the Jalapeño, in fact, I am firmly on Team Chili Cheese Dog. This has some excellent flavor from the chili, there are some nice hits of cheese throughout that are less aggressive and better spaced than in the basic Cheese Dog. And perhaps most importantly, it feels like you’re eating something different. This isn’t a hot dog where I regretted eating this instead of a basic hot dog; this is something I would eat in addition to a hot dog at a barbecue.

I understand it’s a hot dog, just go with me here.

I also tried these with the Truff Star Wars Dark Side hot sauce, which vastly improved the flavor of all of them – and complemented the Chili Cheese one, in particular. And later tried them all with mustard, which was fine but virtually wiped away the flavors of the dogs.

So while in my personal rotation these won’t replace your tried and true hot dog any time soon, they’re a fun addition to the grill this summer. My recommendation? Grab the chili cheese, but you do you.