Danish Ristet Pølse
A griddle-browned sausage poking out of both ends of a soft bun, striped with ketchup, mustard and remoulade, buried in raw and crispy onions and topped with sweet cucumber.
On 18 January 1921 six sausage wagons rolled out onto Copenhagen's streets with copper kettles of red sausages heated on Primus burners. TV 2 reports about 700 wagons at the peak in the 1960s and 1970s and about 100 by 2021. VisitCopenhagen says Charles Svendsen Stevns got the permit in 1920, and a sausage cost 25 øre. The Danish encyclopedia Lex says the wagon has both a boiler and a griddle (ristet means roasted on the griddle), and that the Danish sausage is longer than the bun.
Why it works the kitchen science
Sweet, sour, creamy and crunchy
Cool remoulade and sweet-sour cucumber against two kinds of onion give every bite contrast with the browned sausage.
Ristet means roasted
Griddle browning gives a savory crust the boiled red pølse doesn't have.
Step by step
- Step 1
Toss the cucumber with the salt and rest 5 minutes. Add the sugar, vinegar and pepper, toss and let stand at least 10 minutes.
- Step 2
Stir together the piccalilli, mayonnaise, sour cream, apple and capers, then chill.
- Step 3
Heat the oil in a heavy pot to 350°F, about 8 minutes. Toss a handful of onion rings in the flour, shake off the extra and fry 2 to 5 minutes, until light golden. Drain on paper towels, salt, and repeat. (Or skip this step with store-bought onions.)
- Step 4
Heat 1 tsp oil in a large skillet or griddle over medium heat and cook the sausages, turning often, 8 to 10 minutes, until browned all over and steaming hot (165°F for higher-risk eaters).
- Step 5
Warm the buns on the griddle 1 minute, or in a 250°F oven 3 minutes.
- Step 6
Build in the Madens Verden order: mustard in the bun, the sausage, a line of ketchup, a line of remoulade, raw onion, crispy onions and slices of pickled cucumber on top.
Danish Ristet Pølse
Serves 4 (2 hot dogs each) · 8 hot dogs · 50 min total
Sweet pickled cucumber (agurkesalat)
- 1/2 English cucumber (about 10 oz), sliced paper thin
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1/4 cup white vinegar
- Black pepper
Remoulade
- 1 cup jarred piccalilli (mustard pickle relish), finely chopped
- 1/3 cup mayonnaise
- 3 tbsp sour cream or crème fraîche
- 1/2 small apple, peeled and very finely diced
- 1 tbsp capers, chopped
Crispy fried onions (ristede løg)
- 1 large yellow onion, sliced into very thin rings
- 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
- 2 cups neutral oil, for frying
- 1/2 tsp fine salt
- Shortcut: 1 cup store-bought crispy fried onions
Sausages and buns
- 8 long brown pork grill sausages or wieners, ideally longer than the buns
- 1 tsp vegetable oil
- 8 soft hot dog buns
To finish
- 8 tsp mustard
- 4 tbsp ketchup
- 1/2 cup finely chopped raw onion
Method
- Toss the cucumber with the salt and rest 5 minutes. Add the sugar, vinegar and pepper, toss and let stand at least 10 minutes.
- Stir together the piccalilli, mayonnaise, sour cream, apple and capers, then chill.
- Heat the oil in a heavy pot to 350°F, about 8 minutes. Toss a handful of onion rings in the flour, shake off the extra and fry 2 to 5 minutes, until light golden. Drain on paper towels, salt, and repeat. (Or skip this step with store-bought onions.)
- Heat 1 tsp oil in a large skillet or griddle over medium heat and cook the sausages, turning often, 8 to 10 minutes, until browned all over and steaming hot (165°F for higher-risk eaters).
- Warm the buns on the griddle 1 minute, or in a 250°F oven 3 minutes.
- Build in the Madens Verden order: mustard in the bun, the sausage, a line of ketchup, a line of remoulade, raw onion, crispy onions and slices of pickled cucumber on top.
Adapted from Arla's Danish test kitchen (dairy co-op) recipes: Hotdog for the fried onions, Remoulade and Agurkesalat. Assembly order and the brown grill sausage follow Madens Verden, "Ristet hotdog: klassisk hotdog med det hele" by Holger Rørby Madsen. Remoulade per Lex, which defines it as mayonnaise with finely chopped sweet mustard pickles. Arla. Ingredient list follows the source; the method is in our own words.
Tips
- Fry the onions until truly golden; pale onions go soft and greasy.
- Make the cucumber salad and remoulade up to a day ahead.
The rules people argue about
What the sources agree on, what they don't, and what is just a good story.
- Ristet is a fried or griddled sausage, usually a brown grill sausage. The classic red pølse is boiled. Documented (Madens Verden recommends brown for ristet; Danish Wikipedia: the classic is "en rød kogt pølse").
- The sausage sticks out past both ends of the bun. Documented (Lex).
- Remoulade, ketchup, mustard, raw and fried onions. Documented (Lex; Madens Verden). Pickled cucumber is standard at most wagons (Madens Verden; Wikipedia).
- Curry in the remoulade (why it's yellow). Disputed: Tara's Multicultural Table and True North Kitchen add curry powder; Lex and Arla don't mention it. Our piccalilli is already yellow from turmeric.
- Why the red sausage is red. Folklore: the story that old sausages were dyed red as a warning has no source (CPH Post: "legend has it"). The colorant is documented: carmine (E120) replaced erythrosine (E127) in 1981.
- Disputed, the first wagon. Copenhagen on 18 January 1921 (TV 2; Lex) vs Aarhus in 1917 (Stiftstidende). VisitCopenhagen's "1920" is the permit year.
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