Italian Dunkers are a famous school lunch that consist of hot dog buns, butter, garlic powder, Italian seasoning, mozzarella cheese, and a side of marinara. Every time my high school served this for lunch, your ass I ordered doubles.
2 Tbsp Butter
16 oz Mozzarella Cheese
2 Tbsp Grated Parmesan Cheese
4-6 Hot Dog Buns
Marinara Sauce
2 Tsp Garlic Powder
2 Tsp Italian Seasoning
This is a super easy recipe to execute.
The first thing you’re going to want to do is preheat your oven to 400 degrees, that way your oven can warm up while you prepare your ingredients.
Next, you’ll need to soften your butter. Place 2 tbsp of salted butter in a bowl and heat it in the microwave for roughly 30 seconds.
Once your butter is melted, add:
Whisk together until everything is well blended together. This should be the right ratio of butter, spices and cheese. However, it’s possible that the parmesan cheese could absorb too much of the butter to perorational spread across all hot dog buns.
If this happens, just repeat this process in a separate bowl.
If you aren’t using salted butter, go ahead and add a ½ tsp of butter. Salt helps to enhance the flavor of butter by providing a contrast to the richness of the butter. Salt can also help to reduce the greasiness of the butter, making it more palatable. When added in the right amount, salt can also help to bring out the natural sweetness of the butter, making it a popular ingredient in many baked goods or savory dishes.
Shred your fresh mozzarella cheese until it’s in a form where it can be sprinkled across the buns.
Store bought hot dog buns will work just fine for this, but there are recipes that use fresh baked sub rolls instead. For this recipe, I’m just using ballpark hot dog buns, which are pretty narrow and are a good size.
Brush the butter mixture onto the hot dog buns, covering as much of it as possible.
Once your buns have been properly lathered with the butter mixture, sprinkle the fresh mozzarella onto the buns. Similar to the butter, cover as much of the bun as possible with the cheese.
Whether you are cooking this in an air fryer or on a baking sheet, I would highly recommend brushing them and sprinkling the cheese on a separate plate before placing them on the equipment you’ll be using. You don’t want burnt cheese in either scenario.
Bake at 400 degrees for 10 minutes or until the cheese is nice and melted, which will also leave your buns nice and golden brown.
The sole purpose of these is to “dunk” them, particularly into a red sauce of some sort to use as a dipping sauce.. Usually, this is dipped in a marinara sauce, which pairs very nicely with a cheesy garlic bread such as cheesy Italian Dunkers.
Enjoy your cheesy bread!
The G.O.A.T. High School Comedy
High school lunches are often not considered to be of good quality for a variety of reasons. One of the main factors is cost constraints. Schools are typically operating on limited budgets, and they may need to allocate their funds in other areas, such as staffing or equipment, rather than food. As a result, they may not be able to purchase high-quality ingredients, prepare meals from scratch, or offer a diverse menu.
High schools often need to serve a large number of students in a short amount of time, which can lead to mass-produced, pre-packaged, or otherwise processed food that lacks flavor and nutrition. Student preferences and dietary restrictions also play a role in the food that is offered, making it challenging for schools to cater to everyone’s tastes and needs.
With all of that said, it’s crazy that Italian Dunkers school lunch was the most popular among my classmates when they’re made with such few ingredients. Honestly, I’m not even a fan of hot dogs, I choose a hamburger or cheeseburger every time over a hot dog. This is literally the only time i eat hot dog buns, and it’s because they’re smothered with butter, seasoning, and cheese…so I guess that’s probably why they’re delicious.
