Yet Another Donut Sandwich: Finland’s Kuuma Koira

I’ve often told my friends that if I’m invited to a party, I’m either bringing some tryhard dish that I’ve spent way too much time on–like pastrami that had to cure for weeks, or a meticulously researched homemade sausage recipe, or a batched cocktail along with the proper glassware–or I’m going to pick up a box of bad grocery-store bakery cookies at the last minute on my way over. There is no in-between. I try to err toward the former rather than the latter–mostly because I can’t stand those big, soft, fluffy, cakey cookies you can pick in the plastic clamshell containers near the grocery store deli.

Yesterday, June 29th, I went to a party at a friend / colleague’s house. It was a pretty small turnout due to some emergency work stuff that sidelined a few members of our team, and Sean, the friend in question, is sometimes less than proactive about getting the word out when he’s having people over. But it was nice to spend an afternoon / evening in the company of a few people I genuinely like. Plus, I had one more sandwich to write about this month, and I was able to employ my friends as guinea pigs to help me eat it. That sandwich is the Finnish Kuuma Koira.

(Photo credit for the above shots: Sean Doyle. Also, that’s his fancy backyard we were hanging out in)

Kuuma Koira originated in the Finnish town Nokia. The name of the town may seem familiar–if you are old, like me, and had a cell phone in the late 1990s or early 2000s, pre-smartphone era, the odds are good it may have been a Nokia phone. According to Wikipedia, the dish was invented in the 1960s by a grill owner named Teodor Leppänen but with Sean’s help this weekend I was able to connect with his friend Ilkka Kivinummi who lives in or near Nokia, Finland, and get a download of the local lore surrounding the sandwich.

So the story starts with a guy working in a hot dog booth or grill as it they are over here that was selling kind of meat pies (a salty pastry or dough that’s been cooked or fried and has a mix of ground beef and rice inside) that typically have a frankfurter inside. Add mustard, ketchup relish, onions and what not and you’ve got a tasty salty snack that hits the spot after a fun night in a bar. (Somehow all stories have something to do with bars over here 😂)

So, one night the guy is facing a crowd of hungry customers coming just out of the bar and realizes that he’s out of the meat pies. All that he has between him and the (h)angry mob are these flat doughnuts with jelly inside. The guy figures that since they’re made from a similar kind of dough (minus the sugar and jam), he’ll put the frankfurters and other stuffing inside those and his customers were satisfied.

He names the serving Kuuma Koira, literally meaning hot dog. It sort of became a specialty of that single grill in Nokia and he started ordering the ‘buns’ without jam as it burns when  the donut is heated.

It has stayed a local treat but is so weird that many people know about it. I don’t think it’s served anywhere else but Nokia to the date.

Ilkka Kivinummi

Ilkka stopped by the location of the grill that originated Kuuma Koira, Teuto Grilli pictured below, which has since closed.

Ok, so this is the original place in Nokia. However it’s been closed for about a decade now and will probably be demolished sometime in the near future.

Ilkka didn’t stop there, though. He also got a Kuuma Koira from another local spot still selling the sandwich–a place called Terhin Kioski–and sent us photos of both the shop and the sandwich.

We were able to find a grill that sells them however, and will soon get them. Let’s see how they match up with the ones you made.

(Photo credit: Illka Kivinummi)

I have not fully confirmed, but I believe the “flat doughnuts with jelly inside” that Ilkka mentioned are likely possumunkki (sometimes rendered munkkipossu for reasons inexplicable to non-Finnish speakers). Munkki, literally translating as monk or friar, is a Finnish nickname for a donut, and possu means pig, so the word possumunkki is often translated as “piggy donuts.” These Finnish cardamom-scented jelly donuts are rolled out flat and then folded around a small amount of jam–apple jam, usually, though other flavors are possible–and have the corners pinched and stretched to resemble a pig’s ears, or legs, depending on who’s explaining it. The following video is a really nice English-language how-to for making them.

The donuts used for Kuuma Koira nowadays do not generally have the jelly inside, so instead of rolling these out flat and folding them over, I rolled them into rough long john (or hot dog bun) shapes before deep-frying them and tossing them with granulated sugar.

According to the sources I’ve read, the sausages used in Kuuma Koira are steamed rather than grilled or griddled, and the photos that Ilkka sent seem to confirm that, showing long, thin, light pink wieners, cut to length, that are without grill marks or the type of browning that would indicate a more direct heat source.

I can’t tell the quality of the sausages Ilkka got in Finland from the photos, other than to guess that they were extruded, casingless non-beef wieners, likely pork or a pork/chicken mixture from the color. But I also guessed that the quality of this sandwich would depend greatly on the quality of the sausage that I used. These were natural casing, all-beef franks that steamed up nicely and had a great snap to them.

To make the kuuma koira, we start with a sugared donut–these Finnish style donuts have cardamom mixed into the dough, giving them a warm and aromatic character that suggests sweetness without overwhelming with spice.

The donut bun is sliced open and the sausage placed inside.

My research suggested that a sweet homemade Finnish-style mustard with pickle relish would be the most classic topping combination for the kuuma koira. Ilkka’s photos above show ketchup along with pickle relish and, it appears, some presence of mustard as well. I made this Finnish-style mustard to serve with the sandwich–it was sweet and a little bit hot from the Colman’s mustard powder, with a thick and viscous texture from sugar and cream that began to melt upon contact with the hot sausage. The mustard and relish alone, I thought, were sufficient toppings for the sandwich–I won’t shame people for adding ketchup to their hot dogs if that’s what they want, but I’ve never really gotten the hang of ketchup on anything but a burger, myself.

I was, I think, right to go with the good quality Frankfurters. That snap made this sandwich, and the stronger beef flavor was an excellent foil for the sweet and aromatic donut bun, the sweet heat of the mustard, the sour crunch of the pickle relish. But I can see why it would appeal, regardless. The kuuma koira was born as a kind of late-night drunk food, and serving it at a party where the drinks were flowing was a much better way to showcase it than a sit-down family dinner would have been.

I don’t know that I will ever make this sandwich again. But I do feel like it could find an audience in America. Though the US does not have a monopoly on donut-based sandwiches–see Tunisia’s Fricassé and Taiwan’s Nutritious sandwich for 2 non-American examples beyond today’s Finnish specialty–we are the home of the Luther Burger and many other donut-based sandwiches. A donut hot dog seems like a no-brainer. So get on it, late-night hot dog stands! The Kuuma Koira is at least as wholesome an option as anything on or off the menu at Wieners Circle!