The Literal Worst Gluten-Free Hot Dog Bun We Wouldn't Even Feed To The Birds

It can be a challenging food landscape for gluten-free eaters. Convenient drive-thru snacks like fast-food french fries are often an unsafe choice, and products like gluten-free bread can be really pricey. We GF peeps are thankful that commercial non-gluten options exist — don't get us wrong. But some of the prepackaged foods out there that are "free of gluten" aren't remotely worth their high price tags. One example is the hot dog buns from a certain national brand.

Franz Gluten Free hot dog buns retail at a whopping $9.36 for a package of four if you purchase them directly from the Franz website (they come a little cheaper from supermarkets — usually in the $6 to $7 ballpark). Among the handful of gluten-free hot dog bun brands currently available, and there aren't many, Franz definitely ranks as the worst.

Now, this Food Republic writer needs to preface by saying: I'm a diehard fan of Franz Gluten Free's sliced bread. The company has great GF white bread, multigrain, Hawaiian bread (excellent for French toast!), sourdough, and more. Franz is the only sliced gluten-free bread I buy, in fact. This bread brought peanut butter and jelly sandwiches back into my life — something I'll be forever grateful for. But, in stark contrast, the Franz buns are just downright problematic. They're huge, dense, and way too much for one slim hot dog to hold up to. The texture is honestly a bit like eating a dish sponge. If you're seeking a gluten-free bun for your hot dogs, other options out there are a better buy. To paraphrase Obi-Wan Kenobi: These aren't the buns you're looking for.

Despite the unappealing texture, tough-to-chew qualities, and unwieldy size, I used to regularly buy Franz Gluten-Free buns, for lack of options that fit my diet at the time. (Eventually, I gave up altogether and just used bread slices to wrap my dogs in.) I always had to slice one Franz bun into multiple pieces — and even that was almost too much bread for one little wiener. They're just enormous and tough, and I always had to put them on a short trip into the microwave to soften them up and make them even slightly edible. Also, because they're so unyielding, unless you manually press an indentation into the bun to cradle your dog, slip 'n' slide action and dripping condiments are a recurrent reality. I can't even count how many times my hot dogs went shooting out onto the plate (or, worse, my clothes) when I was trying to eat.

These buns might be an okay vehicle for something really juice-forward, like sloppy joes, to counteract the dryness, or an Italian beef sandwich, where you need something sturdy to hold up to the piled-on toppings. Hot dogs, however, don't stand a chance against all that dense bread. Again, I love Franz in terms of its sliced GF bread products. I've just learned from (literally) tough experience to steer clear of the buns — which, unfortunately, goes for the Franz Gluten Free hamburger buns, too.