This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our disclosure policy.
Baked Chili Cheese Dogs are perfect for backyard parties, game day, or just a quick and easy weeknight dinner. These chili dogs are insanely easy and incredibly delicious.
My Homemade Baked Chili Dogs are part of a well balanced picnic or game day party. Just grab some hot dogs and buns, and top them with your favorite chili and cheese. You can use canned chili if you like, or try one of my favorite chili recipes, like Instant Pot Chili, Slow Cooker Chili, or Turkey Chili.
Table of Contents
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
Easy to Make – Especially if you use your favorite canned chili, there’s only a few ingredients and a few simple steps.
Family Favorite – Everyone loves chili cheese dogs and they are definitely a crowd and kid pleasing dinner.
Customizable – You can use different kinds of chili, different kinds of cheese, make it spicy or make it super simple. The choice is yours!
Ingredients
- Hot Dogs – You can use any brand you want. My absolute favorite brand is Nathans Famous. They are skinless and good quality. They also have regular sizes and larger, plumper bun length dogs.
- Hot Dog Buns – Again, you can choose your favorite. I like to buy higher quality buns, like Ballpark, or even a nice brioche bun from the bakery.
- Chili – You can go with a bean of no-bean chili to top your hot dogs, whether you choose to make your own or buy canned chili.
- Cheddar Cheese – As always, I highly recommend grated yourself, right off the block. It will melt much better than pre-shredded.
- Toppings – I like to set out things like chopped red onion, mustard, ketchup, relish, and jalapenos.
How To Make Chili Cheese Dogs
See recipe card below for ingredient quantities and full instructions.
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Arrange the hot dog buns in the dish, and place the hot dogs inside the buns.
- Evenly top each hot dog with a spoonful of chili and top with shredded cheddar cheese.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes or until cheese is melted and hot dogs are fully heated through.
- Top with red onions and a little bit of fresh minced parsley (optional).
Variations
- Tasty Toppings: Chili Dogs are a blank canvas with lots of options for toppings, but the basics, like ketchup, mustard and relish are still great options. Other ideas we love are diced tomatoes, sliced mushrooms, or green onions.
- Sauces: Drizzle with hot sauce, buffalo sauce, Nacho Cheese Sauce, or sour cream.
- Heat: Spice things up with some sliced jalapenos, minced onions, banana peppers or hot sauce.
- Chili: Like we talked about earlier, the type of chili you use is up to you. Grab a few cans to keep it super easy, or whip up a easy chili recipe or even use my Instant Pot Cincinnati Chili and leave out the beans.
- Broil: The baked chili dogs will be piping hot with a crispy bun and melted cheese. But if you want to brown the top, flip on the broiler and leave the pan under it for a few minutes to brown.
Wanna go really crazy? Try topping your chili dog with some creamy Stovetop Macaroni and Cheese!
How to Serve
Baked hot dogs with chili are super simple and rustic, are the perfect pairing for a variety of picnic and backyard bbq type sides. When potato chips and dips won’t cut it, try some of these:
- Best Macaroni Salad Recipe
- Simple Cabbage Salad
- Air Fryer Frozen French Fries
- Veggie Tray
- Southern Potato Salad
- 7 Layer Salad
- Tomato Avocado Salad
- Crispy buns: If you’ve got a few extra minutes, split open the hot dog buns, brush them with butter and toast them in the oven while it’s heating up.
- Hot dogs: If you like your hot dogs with a little crispy skin, you can either grill, bake, or air fry the dogs before placing them in the buns.
- Leftovers: These won’t keep well so I highly recommend only making what you know you’ll use. If you have chili dogs leftover, I’d suggest saving the hot dogs and chili in an airtight container. discarding the buns and using fresh ones
More Fun Easy Dinner Recipes You’ll Love
- Baked Roast Beef Sliders
- Classic Baked Italian Sub Sandwiches
- California Burrito
- Baked Chicken Tacos
- Cheese Enchiladas
Baked Chili Cheese Dogs
Ingredients
- 8 hot dogs
- 8 hot dog buns
- 1 1/2 cups prepared chili
- 2 cups fresh grated cheddar cheese
- Optional toppings: Mustard, relish, ketchup, chopped onion, sliced jalapenos
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Arrange the hot dog buns in the dish, and place the hot dogs inside the buns.
- Evenly top each hot dog with a spoonful of chili and top with shredded cheddar cheese.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes or until cheese is melted and hot dogs are fully heated through.
- Top with red onions and a little bit of fresh minced parsley (optional).
We tried this for the first time last night and it looked delicious and tasted delicious!
Nice! Thanks for stopping by Leigh.
These are delicious! I made them on a recent camping trip for my family and everybody loved them. I used a brioche bun and leftover chili I made. We don’t eat a lot of hot dogs, but these are definitely worth making again! So easy but so very good! Thank you for the recipe!
You are so welcome Lisa! Thanks for stopping by.