Today I had to drive to the big city to drop Tammy off, and it was around lunchtime, so I stopped at a place I go to about twice a year, a little hole in the wall that sells nothing but dirty water hot dogs:
That little blue thing- that’s basically it. I have no idea what is in the rest of the house it is attached to, but that blue front is the whole place. You open the door, run right into a counter with about 4 stools and they make your dogs right there. And they are amazing.
Now when I say dirty water dogs, I mean just plain old dogs simmering in a tepid pool of gray water. And these are not artisanal dogs or any shit like that. We’re not talking all beef franks with a natural casing. We’re talking real American hot dogs made out of all the shit they can’t put into a chicken nugget or that is too low quality to make scrapple or sausage, mash it all together into a pink slime with an assload of chemicals, and throw it into something resembling a casing. If you read the label it will tell you made from chicken, turkey, pork and a list of other stuff, but they could really just write “lol animals and shit” because YOU KNOW WHAT YOU ARE GETTING AND YOU DON’T GIVE A FUCK.
They then take the dog, put it in a sad, damp bun- you know the kind, like wonder bread but with less lust for life, the kind you see on the bottom shelf of your grocery store bread aisle that come in an eight pack and half of them have inevitably been crushed or stepped on while stocking them and the sign says “59 cents but will negotiate” in magic marker on one of those pink stars.
Once in the bun-like object, it is covered with an all “meat” chili that comes in mild, medium, or hot. I don’t know if it’s actually meat- it could be soy or something else, all I know is there is nothing as natural as a bean anywhere in it. We’ll just call it meatlike chili sauce. On top of that, if you like, and I do, they will top it with an overly creamy cole slaw. The end product looks like this:
And they are fucking fantastic. I could probably shove an entire one in my fat face and eat the whole thing in one bite, but I don’t because you gotta savor this shit. And I love them. But I only get them about every six months, because while they are amazing, in about 45 minutes, I will have the world’s worst heartburn and sometimes awful things happen later on.
But it’s totally fucking worth it.
ALurkSupreme
No, thanks, really. I’ve eaten.
PsiFighter37
That looks unappealing, and that is being kind. It also looks like I’d be shitting my pants very shortly thereafter.
Sab
When I was a child, all the school lunch hot dogs were dyed bright red (same color as pistachio nuts used to be.) To me those are the only real American hotdogs.
I can’t imagine what effect they had on ADHD kids.
Anotherlurker
If you folks are ever in Oyster Bay, NY, you must give the dirt water dogs of Bonanza’s Stand a try. They are steamed with sauerkraut, the buns are steamed in a compartment above the ‘kraut. Order 2 dogs and a large Lemon Ice and you have the perfect townie’s lunch.
dlwchico
Some 40+ years ago my dad and I went to the drive-in, just the two of us. Before we left the house he put a bunch of hot dogs in the bun, wrapped em in foil and put them in the oven broiler for a while. Then we took em out, put them in a bag and went to watch what was probably some pretty terrible movies on a giant screen while sitting in our car.
Those hot dogs were magical. I don’t think I’ve ever had hot dogs since that tasted as good. I’ve tried to replicate them over the years, but no go.
Hard to believe it was so long ago.
NotMax
IMHO, nothing but electric yellow mustard ought to further adulterate a dirty water dog. Okay, maybe also a drape of limp, pale, over-steamed kraut, but that’s it. YMMV (and obviously does.)
I swear by papaya enzyme pills (now also available in chewable form) for tummy upset/heartburn. One or two of those usually does the trick. Also can take them beforehand if expecting to be downing anything which might trigger the upset
CaseyL
The proprietor’s name wouldn’t happen to be C.M.O.T. Dibbler, would it?
NotMax
@Sab
Unaccountably popular in the 50th state.
But then, a step up from the ready-made bento-type plate lunches at the old school markets which feature as the centerpiece – (wait for it) – turkey tails.
Barbara
I was with you until the overly creamy cole slaw.
Omnes Omnibus
À chacun son goût. No thank you.
hells littlest angel
When I read this,I think of all the pictures of your own cooking that you’ve posted, and I have to admit I start to wonder if they weren’t heavily Photoshopped.
Seriously, almost everything about this post is nauseating.
debbie
Makes me long for a hot dog from an NYC street cart, except with sauerkraut and mustard. Zantac fixes everything.
M31
now that is some glorious writing, sir,
NotMax
@Barbara
Yeah, it kind of looks as if someone put Edgar Winter into a food processor and then spread it on top.
:)
delk
There’s a hot dog joint by my place called Chubby Wieners.
FlyingToaster
When I was in HS, we used to get the bright red dogs at Royals’ games. We speculated that they were made of sweepings from the floors of the stockyards, plus pulverized coke bottles as glue. But man, those were good.
I wouldn’t touch them now, 40-years on. They’d likely kill me.
chris
Yes! There’s one of those places near my aunt in Maine. Auntie won’t indulge but I do. Awful terrible yummy dogs!
Spanky
This is an essay I would be unlikely to find in, say, The New Yorker. Although if it was there, I might actually subscribe.
BC in Illinois
@Barbara:
This is what makes it.
Now, since the heart “event” of 18 months ago [pain, ignored pain, not-ignored pain, EKGs, heart cath, stents, cardiac rehab, stern warnings, diet, weight loss, cholesterol-consciousness*, etc] I have cut back on the hot dogs and bratwursts, but if I were to go for it, it’s the overly creamy cole slaw that would make it all worthwhile. Now I’m hungry.
*Cholesterol consciousness is like krishna consciousness, but healthier.
frosty
Tommy’s Burgers, Beverly and Ramparts, LA. I have no idea what’s in the chili they put on their burgers. But it’s worth eating at least every 6 months.
jl
I have an extraordinarily robust alimentary canal, from start to finish. So, I would fear no immediate bad consequences from those hot dogs. So, sure, one or twice a year, I could do one. Not sure about three.
Cole didn’t give a review of the dirty water, though.
Tim C.
I just got back from Bavaria where they make a Weisswurst in a pretzel bun, with sweet mustard on it. God has blessed the country of Bavaria.
daize
Sounds like the hot dogs one would get at Vet Stadium (and many other ballparks I suppose) back in the ’70’s. The hot dogs were absolutely delicious. Guys would walk around with big aluminum boxes on their chests with the hot dogs and condiments inside. The aroma when the seller would open the lid was like nothing else. I didn’t even like sauerkraut back when I was a kid and the aroma would still make my mouth water.
Sab
@NotMax: You still have those? (I have a weird feeling we had this exact same comment exchange about 10 years ago?)
ETA: except the turkey tails. Actual turkey tails?
Roger Moore
@debbie:
Just so long as you don’t confuse it with Xanax.
Eljai
When I first looked at that photo of the hot dogs, I thought they were topped with mashed potatoes. Slightly relieved to find out my eyes deceived me. ?
Rand Careaga
The world’s worst heartburn can be addressed by over-the-counter antacids. Mine is Tums “mega-super-ultra-extra-strength.” I prefer Tums and related remedies because I understand the chemistry: hydrochloric acid is reduced to water and carbon dioxide. Easy-peasy, and instant relief. I used to purchase Tums in the 55-gallon drum size from Costco, but with sundry changes in dietary practices i have reduced my consumption.
R-Jud
Oh dear me, no. I’ll stick with the hot dogs from the Windmill in Belmar, New Jersey* as my platonic ideal.
*There are other Jersey Shore locations, but this one is “mine”.
Mary G
Now I want Tommy’s or Costco dogs.
Stephanie Perry
@dlwchico: when my dad would travel for business, my mom would cook up 2 packs of hotdogs, boiling the weiners, wrapping them in those cheap buns, squirt a bit of mustard. Wrap them in a napkin and store in a stock pot- to keep the dogs warm. One dr. Pepper or Coca-Cola each, and a big bag of potato chips. Off to the drive in, $2.00 a carload. And we were certainly a carload – 5 kids and my mom. I saw “imitation of life” when I was 10 y.o.!
NotMax
@Spanky
Maybe not quite Cole-esque, from The New Yorker.
Bonus mandatory cartoon.
geg6
I only eat hotdogs at two places. One is the Brighton Hotdog Shoppe, a small local chain. Though their cheeseburgers are seriously awesome and I often get them there, the iconic meal is a dog with chili and cheese with a side of their hand cut fries with chili and cheese. And a chocolate shake, which I’d to die for. The hotdogs are made locally with a special recipe only for the franchises. The other is the iconic place of my college years, The Original I’m the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh. Better known as the Dirty O. Cheap but delicious dogs. Plus you could get a pitcher of beer and an order of their legendary fries that was as big as John Cole’s head for about $7. If you shared (which we rarely did unless totally broke), you could have drinks and a meal for $3.50. It was the perfect place for college students. Just perfect.
Sab
@Spanky: Have you never read Calvin Trillin? He would have eaten those and raved about them.
debit
The foot long hotdog at the MN State Fair is my secret weakness. I know they’re made of Grade Z meat, but damn, get some sauteed onions and some mustard on ’em and there’s nothing better. Until the digestive process begins, anyway. And that’s why I no longer go to the State Fair. Thank you for attending my Ted Talk.
Jager
@frosty:
Had a Tommys last week, the fries are dynamite too.
Citizen_X
@Rand Careaga: Plus, they’re just ground-up marble! Er, excuse me, food-grade calcium carbonate.
BC in Illinois
@delk:
“Chubby Wieners” brings to mind a generational shift that took place in the Vacation Bible School of the church I was at, when I was still in Illinois.
On the last day of VBS, there would always be hot dogs, punch, and cookies. When the older women — [the “Dorcas Society,” who had at one time been the young women’s society, but that was when Ike was in office] — did the refreshments, they would get out a large pot, first thing in the morning and boil the hot dogs for 2 – 3 hours, until they were all plump and moist and bursting through the skins. The kids loved them.
When the younger women of the 21st century took over, they thanked the older women profusely, then instituted a new regime. They would boil the hot dogs for 15 – 20 minutes or so. Not so chubby. The kids loved them.
Spanky
@NotMax: A paragraph starting with “I was on a mission, disguised as a jaunt” has no place in an essay that should (in Cole’s case) say “These dogs will literally fuck your shit up.”
BTW: You get points for “Edgar Winter in a food processor”. Leaves the Youngs wondering who that guy is, too.
zhena gogolia
That is a prose poem Baudelaire would envy.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@frosty: Yup, they do have other locations.
guhm61
That place is the real deal: the neon open sign is busted.
Yarrow
It kind of looks like someone put whipped cream on those hot dogs.
Jager
Went to a Red Sox game one night, a guy was selling Italian sausages outside of Fenway, the game was over around 9:30, we walked to a club on Boylston down by the Common, left about 1 in the morning, the same guy was selling Italian sausages outside the club. The peppers were a little limp, never the less…
kindness
Yow! OK, please John, no pics from the awfulness that comes later. That’d just be TMI, honestly.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Tim C.:
Yup, the Drumpf’s left.
NotMax
@Sab
Locals I know who were born and grew up here swear those are the only kind that count as a hot dog. Long time local concern makes blindingly bright “Red Maui Hot Dogs” among other redder than red comestibles (#1 – #2).
And yes – Actual. Turkey. Tails.
Joe Falco
Those look great, creamy cole slaw and all. Tomorrow, I’m going over to Sonic and order way too many 50 cent corndogs.
MomSense
@BC in Illinois:
I am genetically predisposed to high cholesterol which means I can’t eat all those tasty meat, cheesy, and dairy things. Sigh.
Redshift
Belated response to Travels with Charley and Kate from yesterday’s thread: I will also be at Worldcon, and would be up for a meetup. Maybe a front pager could do a post for us so more people might see it?
SRW1
So, ahm, Trump is delaying the next round of tariffs on Chinese imports until December to avoid adverse effects on US shoppers during their Xmas shopping. And there I thought Trump had always claimed that it’s the Chinese who eat these tariffs.
Izz the presnit learning?
Barbara
@Sab: Calvin Trillin is a brilliant writer. His essay on his wife after she died made me cry. It was wry, funny and just suffused with love.
A Ghost To Most
I used to eat stuff like that. Then I got a job.
Whatever burns your bowl .
?BillinGlendaleCA
@SRW1:
Immma gonna go out on a limb here…NO.
Redshift
Oh, and greetings from Ireland, everyone!
BC in Illinois
@Tim C.:
In St Louis, just across I-55 from Anheuser-Busch, is Gus’ Pretzels, where you can get real sell-em-on-the-street pretzels, including pretzel dough containing a bratwurst or a salsiccia (Italian sausage). Great with mustard. I could see it with cole slaw, but you have to get that yourself.
If you want to show that you are old-time St Louis, you can mention the time when you had to go down the alley to Gus’, like you were buying it from the back door of the kitchen.
Gus’ Pretzel, since 1919
Now I’m hungry.
namekarB
Why Do packages of hot dogs have a different count than packages of buns? Last time I got dogs, every brand was in a package of 8. Buns, however were in packages of either 6 or 12. The only way I could get an equal number of dogs to buns was to get 24.
CONSPIRACY?
TenguPhule
-Memoirs of a Trump voter //
NotMax
@Redshift
“I dreamed I visited Ireland in my Maidenform bragh.”
:)
TenguPhule
@namekarB:
Welcome to Marketing.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@BC in Illinois: Hmmm, website says 1920.
TenguPhule
@NotMax:
Go Ketchup or go home.
A Ghost To Most
@NotMax: Snicker. JC had me until the albino paste.
FlyingToaster
Okay, some fuckwit just set off about a hundred firecrackers down by the Charles (and they’re doing it again). For Fucks Sake, asshats, it’s August, and every damn house in Bemis and Nonantum is woodframe.
Spanky
@namekarB: Hot dog buns have a high failure rate, so you get spares.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@namekarB: You might want to use the hot dog without the bun.
RAVEN
The hot dog is topped with yellow mustard, chopped white onions, bright green sweet pickle relish, a dill pickle spear, tomato slices or wedges, pickled sport peppers and a dash of celery salt. The complete assembly of a Chicago hot dog is said to be “dragged through the garden” due to the many toppings.
Martin
Those look like ass, but I get the appreciation for them. There’s something about ‘how the fuck did we pass the health inspection’ hole in the wall places, that serve food of questionable provenance, that exist through some ancient culinary genius married to an abject incompetence at operating a business that just can’t be substituted.
Quinerly
@BC in Illinois: Gus! Near my neighborhood! Poco and I walk there on Tuesdays. Too hot today.
SRW1
@Redshift:
If you’re in Ireland, shouldn’t you be safely in bed by now?
BC in Illinois
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
1920 is correct.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@BC in Illinois: My dad arrived in Misery in 1919.
Procopius
@Tim C.: One of the many foods I loved while stationed in Germany was the mustard. Oh, the breads, the wursts, the cheeses were wonderful, but I had never imagined mustard could be prepared in so many forms.
TenguPhule
@Sab:
Yes. We also have pigs feet, pig ears, vinegar pork, chicken feet, chicken tails and fried chicken gizzards.
Just One More Canuck
“Wonder bread but with less lust for life”
Sheer poetry
Amir Khalid
@R-Jud:
This is the one and only thing I know about Belmar: The E Street that Bruce named his band after is in that town.
Martin
@RAVEN: Chicago dogs are really good, but like with their pizza, they take a good servicable food and make it unwieldily. It’s like they’re overcompensating. Hot dog can be accessorized with mustard, relish, onion, saurkraut, and chili if you’re fancy. That’s it. And if you can’t eat your pizza on the way to the Hayden Planetarium, then GTFO. Pizza, hot dogs, and knishes exist because all other foods either require a fork or a 2nd hand and I got shit to do.
Gin & Tonic
In Olneyville, RI (part of Providence) there’s a place called New York System that make hot weiners (just cheap hot dogs) with a meat-like substance on top, that you sprinkle liberally with celery salt, eat, and wait for the glorious heartburn. Nobody knows why they’re called New York System, as they have nothing to do with New York. But the local shorthand for them is “gaggers.” Yes.
Everybody needs to visit Providence to eat some.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@TenguPhule:
…and Spam.
Sab
@Barbara: Yes he is. I also loved that essay. But he will eat anything and love it.
I do take your point that he wouldn’t have written Cole’s post, but I am sure he would appreciate the feelings behind it.
A Ghost To Most
@RAVEN: I never got that. That relish looks radioactive.
TenguPhule
@SRW1:
Jokes on the shoppers. The tariffs resume 12/15, so right when everyone who didn’t buy on Black Friday starts actually getting the presents.
TenguPhule
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Well yes, but that goes without saying.
Roger Moore
@SRW1:
No. SATSQ.
NotMax
@TenguPhule
Willing to bend if it’s the ketchup-y New York onion sauce. (But not so far as to consider the Dijon mustard the linked site recommends to accompany it.)
TenguPhule
@Spanky:
How does that even work?
Steve in the ATL
@Omnes Omnibus: quel mal goût!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@TenguPhule: So I was right, he ain’t learnin’.
geg6
@Procopius:
It was my grandfather, who often cooked the German food his mom made, who bequeathed me his love of mustard in all its glorious forms.
TenguPhule
@NotMax: Oh that sounds delicious. (not the mustard)
Martin
@Mary G: Tommy’s exists in an interesting middle dimension. They’re a proper chain, and yet their shitty food is amazing. In the land of In-N-Out, you can actually find a comparably good burger by going downmarket. I respect that.
Mike in NC
There’s a little joint the next town over called “the hot dog” where they claim the franks and rolls are made onsite. Not sure what else they sell. Drinks and fries, maybe. Have yet to try it but other folks either loved it or hated it.
geg6
@TenguPhule:
Blasphemy. Just…blasphemy.
A Ghost To Most
@geg6:
What about horseradish? My grandfather gave me a twisted love for limburger, onion, and horseradish on rye sammiches.
Martin
@Tim C.: I would fly back to Austria just for the Kasekrainer. Good lord were they good.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Martin: They’re different than In-N-Out, Tommy’s competition is more like 5 Guys(I pass the one in the local mall and it doesn’t smell appealing).
?BillinGlendaleCA
@geg6: Agreed.
FlyingToaster
@TenguPhule: I’m with you. I want mustard on proper German sausages, and ketchup on ‘dogs.
I’m already cheezed off because of the “shelling of Bemis”, so don’t even start.
NotMax
@Martin
Also too, falafel in a pita.
The best roasted chestnuts were sold every winter from a street cart right outside the Hayden planetarium. There were plenty of others around the city, but none to compare to that one location.
RAVEN
Ya’ll heard of these Impossible Burgers?
?BillinGlendaleCA
In Southern CA, for hot dogs, it’s Pink’s.
Hoodie
Those are just nasty, particularly the slaw. Just the way I like them. If I feel like risking heartburn,I go for dogs from Snoopy’s or the Varsity, or charred dogs from the Roast Grill (chili or slaw available, but no relish, kraut or, god forbid, ketchup).
FlyingToaster
@Martin: If you’re anywhere near a Wegmans, they sell them in the meat/charcuterie department. I have a package about 10 feet from me (but the pasta’s cooking).
tomtofa
I was in Copenhagen a little while ago; street hotdog stands are ubiquitous there. Lots of kinds – boiled, grilled roasted, short or long. And cheap. A great topping there is crispy fried onions, along with the usual condiments. They also like to top them with a layer of pickles, though I usually declined that. Bonus advantage to the long ones: you can chomp off the dog ends on either side of the bun to take the edge off the craving, then settle down to the hotdog in a bun itself.
Minor quibble: relish is an unknown thing in the parts of Europe we visited. Along with everything else, a hotdog needs relish, IMHO.
Mary G
A Ghost To Most
@RAVEN: The first plant burger that is actually edible , by many accounts.
zhena gogolia
Speaking of Trillin, those flat hamburgers at Winstead’s really are very good.
Jay
Nancy’s gonna need a bigger wagon,
BTDubs, the only hot dog is toasted on a stick, coathanger on an open fire after dark with only French’s Mustard as a condiment.
Dessert is s’mores.
raven
@Hoodie: A naked dog walkin!
SRW1
@TenguPhule:
Actually, if I understand the technicalities right, tariffs apply to stuff shipped from the day on which these tariffs are declared, but not to stuff that is already in country or on route.
Mary G
TenguPhule
@A Ghost To Most:
Think you meant tasteful. The rest are edible but taste terrible.
geg6
@A Ghost To Most:
Not a Limburger fan but I love me some homemade horseradish. And his sauerkraut was to die for.
geg6
@RAVEN:
I have heard they are pretty good.
LuciaMia
Damn, John.You really know how to sell it.
Jay
@A Ghost To Most:
Naw, Money’s and Yeve’s were good, great actually, until they sold out their Companies and the Corporations changed the recipies to save money.
The Impossible Burger’s are the closest to beef, flavour wise.
Arlene
In Allentown, Pa. we have “Yocco’s” chili dogs. Hog dogs with a special chili sauce, no beans. The ingredients in the sauce are secret. The name “Yocco” is the Pennsylvania Dutch pronunciation of the name, Iacocca. The family that owns “Yocco’s” are Lee Iacocca’s relatives. Seriously, those chili dogs are great.
NotMax
@geg6
One grandmother made horseradish that could bring tears to the eyes of people in the next county. Wonderful, wonderful stuff.
A Ghost To Most
@geg6:
When I was in college in Shippensburg, my landlord in the other side of the house grew and bottled large quantities of horseradish. The house reeked during the grinding, but what horseradish! We also had a friend who made excellent sauerkraut.
TenguPhule
UK is utterly fucked.
The Tories are talking themselves into thinking No-Deal won’t be so bad after all.
Mary G
Corgi living his best life gif:
NotMax
@Arlene
Do they offer chow chow as a topping?
TenguPhule
@Arlene: The only good thing Texas has ever done for us was Beanless Chili.
Jay
And if any Jackal’s ever wind up in Vancouver, ride the Skytrain to New Westminister for Burger Heaven. Worth it.
Roger Moore
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Not really the same category, but you need to try Oki-Dog.
NotMax
@NotMax
Strict;y red horseradish, BTW. Never once knew her to bother with the wimpy whitish kind.
Ruckus
Nothing beats the hot dogs for Tuesday lunch at Great Lakes Naval Station back in 1970.
Very large steam kettle full of lukeish warm water with some form of dull gray meatish product floating around and splotchy red die floating on top of the water. Yummy. Whatever is the cheapest mustard like product available to put on the 4 day old buns. YUM.
Did I sell it to hard?
There are two foods I find difficult to eat, and it all stems from having to eat to slow down starvation in the navy. Hot dogs and chicken. Two months I had good food. In San Diego we had Master Chief Johnson’s Diesel Fried Chicken. When in Europe I’d find a local bakery and buy a loaf of bread and some BP and J to eat instead of the ships food when back under way. I know some cooks where just incompetent, some didn’t care and some were just fucking hateful of other human beings.
NotMax
@TenguPhule
Wouldn’t that be a Sloppy Joe (sans bun)?
A Ghost To Most
@Jay:
I wouldn’t know. I’ve never been tempted. I’ve read several articles stating that Impossible could draw the attention of non-food masochists.
NotMax
@Ruckus
Too oily.
:)
A Ghost To Most
@NotMax: I’ve never seen red horseradish. The best white stuff will dry clean your sinuses.
Arlene
@Not Max No chow chow, thankfully
chris
@RAVEN: Impossible burger is pretty good, as it should be given the price. I bought a pack of two 115g burgers ($7.49!!!) out of curiosity. It’s not meat but it’s damn close on a bun with or without cheese and your choice of condiments. I wouldn’t mind living on it but that won’t happen when I can get two 115g lean burgers for about $2.
Ruckus
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Mine left in 1918
TenguPhule
@NotMax: I think the spices make the difference.
TenguPhule
@Ruckus:
How could you tell the difference?
smedley the uncertain
@Rand Careaga: Alka Seltzer on the rocks…. Calms the savage tummy.
MoxieM
@chris: OMG, about…40 years ago… my big brother and I used to drive out a country road in the ’61 red VW bug, with the canvas roof pulled all the way back. We would stop at some little joint that looked alot like John’s in the picture, minus the house, and get the world’s best chili dogs. Maybe “chili dogs”. I’m not sure they even served drinks. Besides the fried-everything fisherman’s platter, always some of my best summer memories. You can still get the fried-everything and choke your arteries on a paper plate, but the dog joint is long gone. Covered in weeds I expect.
NotMax
@A Ghost To Most
Can rectify that in a jif. It’s the beet juice which gives it the color and a bit of extra tang.
Jay
@A Ghost To Most:
Had soy “burgers” back in the 70’s. Mostly inedible.
Anfter my divorce, dated some vegan women, so had Moneys and Yeve’s, pan fried and bbq’d. Bbq’s was better. A&W introduced the Impossible burger about a year ago. I tried one, pretty good, then they sold out. 6 months worth of inventory and supply chain gone in two weeks.
Bill Arnold
@Mary G:
Ugh. FWIW here’s a longer clip:
Ken Cuccinelli: The Statue of Liberty poem was talking about ‘people coming from Europe’(August 13, 2019, Matthew Chapman)
I’m now wondering how I’d respond to hearing this face-to-face. “Scum” would be heard by him, for sure.
And it’s not just a minor change. Allowing unaccountable immigration employees even more latitude in determinations of the probability of becoming a public charge in the future is authoritarian crap.
Also, the rich people that I’ve known in my life are generally (median) worse human beings that the not-rich, unless one measures human worth by financial net worth. Which DJT and many in his administration do. People generally get rich by being selfish and greedy and/or exploiting or taking from other human beings.
There are exceptions. But, well, “name a famous living engineer”. If that’s too hard, “name a famous living scientist”.
FlyingToaster
@A Ghost To Most: That’s usually the polish variety with beets to color them red. They’ll burn your sinuses as badly as the plain white.
mrmoshpotato
Now I want a bart with kraut for supper. Off to the store I go.
Oh, and beer.
A Ghost To Most
@Jay:
Different strokes. I’d rather eat well. I’ll be dead a long time.
Raven
@Ruckus: I was the bat boy for the GLNTC Baseball team in the summer of 56. My old man was the football coach at North Chicago High and rave the special services at Great Lakes during the summer. The team took a train tour of Naval Bases on the East Coast and I got to go!
Yutsano
*raises hand sheepishly*
What if we don’t like hot dogs period?
catclub
I am right there with JCole. About twice a year now is perfect.
Two hot dogs all the way, at Grecian Corner in Winston-Salem, also have onions with the ‘chili’ and coleslaw. Yellow mustard and ketchup.
They are better (less dye) than 40+ years ago, but still keep the same idea going.
Jay
@Ruckus:
@TenguPhule:
Always got good food, hot and lots of it, with the Seaforths.
Might have been because we were armed.
Might have been because there were food riots amongst Canadian Troops in WWI, and they learned that an Army fights on it’s stomach.
Raven
@chris: Cool, thanks all.
Gin & Tonic
@Yutsano: Love it or leave it, you commie.
Yutsano
@Jay: Hold that thought: I might be in Vancouver in January.
Mary G
@Bill Arnold: I thought Twitler’s initial appointees were horrible, but these new acting ones that can’t get Senate approval are exponentially more awful.
Jay
@Bill Arnold:
Only 4 US Nobel Winners in 2018, all “immigrants from shithole countries”
2017, ditto.
catclub
@Bill Arnold: and these are Christians who claim to have read the bible, like exodus, and the passover,
and ‘I was a stranger in a strange land’ and it just runs right off of them.
debbie
@Mary G:
I hope the turnout for his wife’s funeral is bigger than Trump’s February rally in El Paso and that Trump gets abused all over Twitter for that.
catclub
@chris: Someone usefully pointed out that making hamburger from not-meat does not really solve the problem.
People generally want cuts like steaks, and the hamburger is what is made of all the pieces that are not good enough to serve as cuts of meat.
Find a way to replace a steak with a not-meat product and people would not be killing cows anymore.
Sctrojan90
It’s 7-8 hours later now and I’ll bet you’re still shitting. Good times!
chris
@Jay: Tofu dogs! Blech.
I don’t mind veggie burgers like Yves with lots of stuff on them but I need to eat at least four to get enough protein. The Impossible is much better for that, very close to meat.
Jay
@Yutsano:
Il Mercado, 1st and Commercial, thin crust Durham Wheat, hardwood fired pizza, try the Margerhita, ( prosutto, basil, tomato sauce, fresh mozzerella).
Vancouver is a food heaven, and you don’t have to pay a lot.
Come for the views, stay for the Pho.
TenguPhule
@Yutsano:
Then you have to argue about pizza toppings.
dexwood
Esskay hot dogs, Utz potato chips, Koontz milk. The food of my people when I was a child in the 50s.
RAVEN
@dexwood: Utz chips are available here but their awesome pretzels are not. I think Snyders keeps them out.
chris
@catclub: Yep. Apparently lab-grown meat is a thing that will be with us soon.
mrmoshpotato
@mrmoshpotato: Damn you autoincorrect!
*brat
Jay
@catclub:
We have different burgers up here.
It’s not floor sweepings of beef with 20% floor sweepings of pork.
It ranges from high fat trimmage, to the trimmings created to make a prime rib crown look pretty.
When I travelled, lived and worked in the US, I was always in awe of how much of the mid point US food was basically garbage, with a few islands of wonderfull.
A Ghost To Most
@Yutsano: Have you ever tried a white hot? I grew up with them in WNY, but have never seen them elsewhere. Much different flavor profile. Much less sweet, much more pepper.
dexwood
@RAVEN:
They ( Utz) reached Albuquerque about 10 years ago, but I think they are no longer to be found. My fault, I never bought them.
schrodingers_cat
I finally wrote about Kashmir like I had promised last week. I have also sent AL a link so she can front page it over here.
Jay
@chris:
It’s not the protien, it’s the mouth feel. 100,000 years of eating meat has left an impression, none of the “veggie burgers” have the fat content,
And Yves arn’t what they were 20 years ago. Back then they were good, now, meh.
Corporations ruin everything.
James Martin
Lucky Dogs in the New Orleans French Quarter while on a wee hours bender. I’ve never eaten one sober. Thanks Ignatius J. Reilly…
A Ghost To Most
@schrodingers_cat: Its a great song. In fact, it’s the next song up on Physical Graffiti.
Oh, wait.
getsmartin
Lucky Dogs in the New Orleans French Quarter while on a wee hours bender. I’ve never eaten one sober. Thanks Ignatius J. Reilly…
Salty Sam
I worked a burger joint in high school- we had a chili-burger on the menu. The manager cut costs by making “chili” with oatmeal. It worked…
TaMara (HFG)
omg. I really need to restart the recipe threads again. I must now go bleach my eyes, brain and palate.
p.a.
@Gin & Tonic: The story that I’ve heard behind the “New York System” name: the original Greek immigrant developer of the wiener thought “N.Y. System” would give them cachet.
olneyvillenewyorksystem.com/make-our-wiener-sauce-at-home/
BCHS Class of 1980
@CaseyL: Love the Discworld reference! And yes, CMOT Dibbler would do land-office business in WV. We are after all, the home of the pepperoni roll and slaw on hot dogs ?. I never liked slaw growing up, but I started getting it asan adult because it grossed out my Syracuse-born girlfriend.
BCHS Class of 1980
@Barbara: It’s a WV thing. Even we don’t understand.
A Ghost To Most
@TaMara (HFG): Yeah, well, people say that okra is fit for human consumption, but I am taking no chances.
NotMax
@Salty Sam
Friend who worked at Dairy Queen here when in high school tells that they would stretch the meat by mixing in ground up stale buns.
RAVEN
@A Ghost To Most: We eat it at least once a week. I slice it long ways and sauté it or slice, sauté and mix with maters and corn.
BCHS Class of 1980
@TenguPhule: Otherwise known as unattached males.
Jeffro
A post on Petri’s most recent column and Cuccinelli saying just now on camera that the Statue of Liberty’s poem meant “people from Europe” would be nice.
Well, not ‘nice’ nice.
RAVEN
@NotMax: Stale crumbs are great in meatballs.
NotMax
@RAVEN
Anecdote he relates is that one day he had a too heavy hand when mixing in the crumbled buns and for the rest of the day every time a burger was cooking the whole place smelled like toast.
Pete Mack
No thanks. Really. Bad hot dogs just never were in my wheelhouse for comfort food, and it is too late to start now. For me, it has been the summer of smoked meat. Mostly, I will throw a couple pounds of good Italian sausage on the Weber with a charcoal and cherry-chip snake, and come back 2 1/4 hours later to some very tasty meat. Cut it into thin slices, and slop on some roasted-tomatillo salsa verde. Just fantastic. Finished up with some grilled sweet corn, which is peaking in upstate NY at the moment. Last week was 3(!) jerked back ribs, for 5+ hours, for a crowd of 20. The ribs barely fit in the grill, so that was a whole lot more work. Italian sausage is ridiculously easy to smoke, and nearly as popular as the ribs.
Amir Khalid
@Tim C.:
Strictly speaking, Bayern/Bavaria is a Bundesland — a state in the Federal Republic of Germany.
@Martin:
I well remember Jon Stewart calling Chicago deep-dish pizza “a casserole”.
Feathers
@Sab: They had jack fucking squat shit effect on the ADHD kids. Whenever they do double blind tests on all this shit that is supposedly terrible for ADHD kids, they show absolutely no effect. When they ask parents or teachers “Does X have an effect?”, they get an “Oh, god, YES!!!” Part of the problem is that attention, good or bad, is crack for the ADHD brain. It’s why having been the class clown almost qualifies one for a diagnosis on its own. So, telling a kid red dye will make you act up, gets a kid to go wild and run around driving everyone crazy when they eat something red. Even if it was beet juice that made it red.
Now, someone may have a reaction to certain allergens or other food/sensory items that has nothing to do with their ADHD. However, because people with ADHD have a narrower “safe” range for functioning (i.e., sleep, nutrition, exercise, stress), the reaction may be blamed on the ADHD, when in fact they are having the same physiological reaction someone without ADHD would have.
Oh, and Star Market no longer sells Hebrew National. So I bought the dogs that were on sale. Yuck. I might like them if they were dolled up like the one’s John had, but these are just gross. I’m debating whether to chuck them or put them in the future in case of future desperate moments.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
My god. My god. / Chicago Nixon voice
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Amir Khalid:
Well, it is now.
Amir Khalid
@mrmoshpotato:
This coinage is awarded the Amir Khalid Stamp of Approval. I stamp my foot: there, it’s approved.
BCHS Class of 1980
@Salty Sam: My mom’s hot dog chili recipe included Corn Flakes as well as ground beef. I could and did eat it by it itself.
LivinginExile
@getsmartin: Lucky Dogs are always best with a gallon of irish coffee, or a gallon of Mardi-Gras beer.
NotMax
@Feathers
Filling a saute pan part way with beer and letting the dogs simmer in that, turning occasionally (poke them a couple of times with a fork first on both sides as they will swell up) covers a multitude of hot dog shortcomings. I like to stir some chopped onions and ground mustard with the beer as it is initially heating to up the taste a skootch. If feeling really adventurous, will add kraut and caraway seeds on top of the dogs to simmer at the same time. Suppose a non-alcoholic brewski would do pretty much the same thing.
Jay
@A Ghost To Most:
It ain’t gumbo with out okra.
NotMax
@Jay
And a healthy dollop of tree.
;)
J R in WV
@Ruckus:
Ruckus, I was at Great Lakes for most of 1970, and the hot dogs were poisonous. Terrible. At sea I ate mostly jerky and hot tea, but we weren’t at sea for more than a couple of weeks, just to prove Bldg 16 could still travel on it’s own power. ASM 16 it were.
We had some cooks put on report for serving mid-rats that put everyone on the watch down with food poisoning. Green salami, I don’t know why anyone thought it was fit to eat!
US Navy food sucked, even in our sub squadron.
MarySNJ
Yup. Up in our parts (northern New Jersey) we call dirty water hotdogs with “chili” sauce (kind of like meat slurry), mustard and onions “hot dogs all the way”. They are delicious. But I can believe that hotdogs with chili and creamy coleslaw would also be very tasty.
chris
Just because you can… Watermelon ham, anyone?
jl
@Bill Arnold: The proposed rule is authoritarian and lawless garbage. I hope and expect it’s blocked in the courts. Convenient for us that the Trumpsters’ attempts at excuses and explanations only make things clearer and uglier.
Of course, the Europeans coming back then were Jews, Poles, Italians, Lithuanians, and they were loathed and feared back then as a foreign threat to our country and culture. One of the reasons strict quotas were put on their immigration in the 1920s, and none were put on Hispanic immigrants from the Americas, including Mexicans, was that the Hispanics were considered a better class of people, more able to assimilate, more obedient and harder workers, not a threat to our culture.
So, again, we see the whole immigration threat business is a cynical fraud that the powerful and rich use to divide and conquer the poor and powerless, and rule them, and impoverish them. Including their poor white dupes.
Yutsano
@Jay: I’m taking a friend from California and hopefully one from Texas as well. Officially we’re going to a convention but I want to show off part of the ancestral homeland.
Oh and see if I can find the statue of my great great grandfather’s brother.
elllie
Those hot dogs scare me. I have such a delicate stomach that I imagine I will be eating air and ice in my golden years.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@jl:
This is true. Cuccinelli, kinda sounds Italian.
Yutsano
@TaMara (HFG): You should! I have a zucchini bread recipe that I have perfected from an old family cookbook. It’s pretty brilliant and EASY
Ruckus
@J R in WV:
You may not have caught that was tongue in cheek. I was in B school there. Thursday lunch was worse than the hot dogs but none of the food served was actually eatable. Thursday lunch was fillet of brontosaurus butt. A sort of footballish shaped brownish lump of unknown origin, possibly a waterproof building material of some sort. One day I took my razor sharp sheath knife with me to lunch and tried to cut it. Didn’t leave so much as a mark. There was an aptly named trash can for all the garbage, which was every thing served but on Thursdays there was another just for the fillets. Next week I swear on mom’s grave that they served that same fillet that we’d had the week before and the week before that and…… could be serving the same fillets today, nothing on earth could destroy them. The cockroach of navy food.
Ruckus
@NotMax:
You use the oil to help get down the food you have to eat the rest of the time, after you run out of bread, BP&J.
3 hots and a rack to sleep in. All the abuse you can take and then some more.
More fun being stuffed into a locker by the football team.
Getting to go ashore in some of the most wonderful places I’ve ever been. Priceless.
A Ghost To Most
@FlyingToaster: Hmm. I grew up in an area thick with Poles and Polish food, but missed that. The family bar is widely known as the ‘Polock Club’, and the food is mainly Polish. Maybe I didn’t recognize it as horseradish.
jonas
My guilty pleasure is those huge, sodium-laden gutbomb kosher dogs they sell for $1.50 at Costco, piled high with relish, ketchup and onions. I could eat like 10 of them if it were my last meal on death row or something, but since I try to be a good boy and not short out the blood pressure machine at the dr’s office, I restrain myself.
Amir Khalid
@chris:
Never mind the watermelon ham. I want to see the watermelon with legs that they cut it from.
rikyrah
Each of us has a hole in the wall spot, Cole ?
The slaw?
Nope?
But, you had me all the way until the slaw.?
Yutsano
@Amir Khalid: Bonus points if it’s somehow halal.
Ninerdave
Hot Dog related:
mercurynews.com/2013/01/10/origins-of-caspers-hot-dogs-a-tale-of-immigration-and-success-out-west/
tl;dr in the San Francisco Bay Area (mostly the East Bay) there are two similarly named Hot Dog establishments Kaspers and Caspers. They both depend from the same original owner, serve the same dirty water hot dogs that John Cole mentions above minus the COLE-slaw. (lol…get it?!?!) and have been a Bay Area staple forever.
Ruckus
@Raven:
Just got hold of my dad’s Honorable Discharge and what would become the DD214. I found out more from that about his service time than from him.
Ruckus
@Mary G:
You start at the bottom of the barrel, the only thing left is the scum that has to be scraped off.
Llelldorin
If anyone’s out in Southern California, give the Hi-Life Chili Cheese Dog in South Pasadena a try. It’s basically a bowl of chili with a hot dog & bun drowned Ophelia-style somewhere in the middle.
I make my chili dogs at home that way still. The rest of my family thinks I’m nuts.
jonas
@catclub: Indeed. The famed Italian butcher Dario Cecchini won’t sell you one of his signature Bistecce Fiorentini unless you also buy a certain amount of the other, less glamorous cuts of beef from the same cow. He says it’s an unethical waste to focus just on steak without appreciating other cuts and products from the animal first.
jonas
@Llelldorin: Is Pink’s on La Brea still around? That used to be the classic Hollywood hot dog stand, with the chili dog being the signature dish. It was ok, iirc, though I never had it as a 2am, postparty hangover cure, for which it was famed.
mkd
@geg6: Yes the Original O -before it was cleaned up after I left Pitt law school across the street- had its share of dirty tables and floors and counters and happy happy bugs, but oh those fries were outstanding. Many a happy hour was spent with a runner getting multiple orders of dogs and fries which then were piled back on the law school lunch tables with IC lites and Heinz ketchup we all kept in our lockers.
Llelldorin
@jonas: Google Maps thinks so :) I’ve been up in the Bay Area for 20 years now, but I still miss Hi-Life.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@jonas:
Yup, always crowded.
Jay
@Yutsano:
Come, be welcome, try the food, tip your waiter,
I’ll be here all week.
Ruckus
Best hot dog I ever had was concoction from a place called Mike’s Hockey Burger. Mike the dad had played ice hockey with the Blackhawks and then opened the coffee shop sort of place, breakfast and lunch, in Vernon, CA. Vernon had/has less than 200 residents at night and about 50,000 durning the work day. It is an industrial town, south east of LA proper. Mike’s served a cheeseburger with 2 butterflied and fried hot dogs. A lot of meat in a bun but damn if they weren’t good. One of my guys could eat 2 and an order of fries. They also had other sandwiches which were even better.
if you wanted sit down there was an amazing place named La Villa Basque. TV show Mad Men was partial filmed there. When it was open as La Villa Basque the food was amazing. Old style booths, leather, low lights but the best part was the food. As the name suggests Basque food mostly but everything was very, very good.
NotMax
@Ruckus
With multiple egresses? Because you should avoid putting all your Basques in one exit.
:)
Jay
Brachiator
Coming late to the thread. Man, them hot dogs look gross.
I would love to try them. I could eat at least two.
I’m sure there are all kinds of posts here about the greatest hot dogs ever. But some of the tastiest dogs I’ve eaten have come from places more anonymous than a pauper’s grave.
jonas
@TenguPhule:
It’s really, quite frankly, all they’ve got at this point. To quote Ned Flanders’ mom: “We’ve tried nuthin’, and we’re all out of ideas!’
Ruckus
@NotMax:
I’m seeing a side of you that does something to me, not sure what it is, but I’m getting an odd feeling, like the navy telling me the food is good or that 3 hrs of sleep is enough or when the doc told me I might have Parkinson’s. No, I know what it is, it’s the same as when the doc told me I actually had cancer.
NotMax
@Ruckus
What can I tell ya? There a checkered suited vaudevillian inside who periodically needs to come out for air.
:)
Kent
This thread is probably dead but the best hotdogs are found at the TigerMart (EXXON) stations on the highways in Chile. They do them with Avocado and Mayo. You ask for a “completo”
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Completo
chopper
please tell me that place is within 50 feet of a bathroom.
Darrin Ziliak (formerly glocksman)
For food variety, the Evansville, Indiana West Side Nut Club Fall Festival is hard to beat.
130+ food booths serving everything from dirty water chili dogs to brain sandwiches.
Despite their local popularity I hated brain sandwiches even before BSE was a thing and I won’t even try the pork brain sandwiches that replaced the calf ones.
HeartlandLiberal
Reminds me of my favorite lunch 50 years ago, while going to college, already married before college, with an infant, working at the public library every night and alternate weekends to support family and get through college. One block from the library was a corner drugstore that served the best slaw dogs in the universe, bar none. I looked forward to those Saturdays I worked because I knew I would be rewarded with a slaw dog for lunch.
Nowadays I eat the healthy dogs, primarily big, plump chicken dogs made by Amish community in northern Indiana, and available in my local grocery store in south central Indiana. Best thing you can eat sometimes, I broil them in the oven till they turn almost black. Yum. FWIW, the same community also produces canned beef and chicken that is expensive, but usually once a year I buy a box and have it shipped to me. Not just for the survival shelf, but because the beef is delicious, and makes wonderful stir fries and soups and stews. If you are interested, Das Dutchman Essenhaus. They have a web site. The chicken dogs come from Miller Poultry, who also have a web site you can check out.
We have visited up there several times, beautiful rolling flat farmlands.
low-tech cyclist
Next time I drive up from the DC area to visit my friend in Pittsburgh, I’m taking I-68 to I-79 just so I can stop in Morgantown and try these dogs.
Chris Johnson
I like using potato buns (mostly normal, but with some potato flour) and Schonland ultra budget mechanically separated chicken and whatever dogs. It’s the cost thing: I found that even well-reviewed brand name hot dogs, when they were more expensive, always had delusions of being sausages or kielbasas or something. The Schonlands are the cheapest ones in my supermarket, otherwise I’d try whatever is the cheapest. They’re bland, slightly weird, full of unspecified protein and delicious. I heat ’em in a saucepan with tap water, and leftover heat from making coffee, and put a spatter-screen over the top of the saucepan to steam the bun.
regulation yellow mustard… or horseradish cheese spread of some variety (Cabot makes one that’s good for this, but the gold standard is Win Schuler’s Bar Scheeze, which is regional so you mostly need to be near the Great Lakes)
John Cole
@low-tech cyclist: I will need a review
L85NJGT
@Kent:
I did a project where a regular lunch stop had a dog wrapped in a slice of bacon, deep fried, topped with crema and avocado slices, served on a lightly toasted bun.
I appreciate the lowest cost exterior residential door they could find… and the paper box.
bluefish
Sounds like a rare happy maker. Some things are just larger than life. I would enjoy those too. With a nice cold Coca Cola.
Ronno2018
Hey John, I love your writing. Can you write an entire book? It would be a pain indeed, but I think you could sell a few copies. Really anything, military stories, living in a rural area, just do it.
We need another Mark Twain, non scummy Garrison Keiler…
Ol'Froth
Best hot dog I’ve ever had was a dirty water dog out of a NYC push cart. Awesome. Been chasing that taste ever since, and never have been able to replicate it, even out of similar NYC push carts.