I wish I lived in Bound Brook, NJ.........

[Tangerine LaBamba]

http://www.amazinghotdog.com/

I've been craving a hot dog for the last few days, and stumbling across this site DID NOT MAKE THINGS ANY BETTER.

:::: grumble, grumble ::::::::

What's the weirdest topping you've ever seen on a hot dog?

[Lucinda]

1. The Rosie O'Donnell dog at Pinks

Rosie O'Donnell LONG ISLAND DOG
10" Stretch Dog, topped with mustard,
onions, chili and sauerkraut <-----they lost me with sauerkraut

Great. Now I want a chili cheese dog. :eyes:
:D

[hippywife]

2. I ain't gonna look.

I've managed to live without hot dogs for years now and it would be too tempting.

When I was a kid, my favorite way to eat a hot dog was raw with mustard. No going back to those days.

:cry:

[TreasonousBastard]

3. Well, there's the Italian Hot Dog at Dee's and...

other places in Joisey.

Imagine two dogs in something like a pita bread with onions, peppers, home fries, and other stuff (mostly grease) and you got the Italian, or Newark, hot dog.

Personally, I never had a better dog than at Rutt's Hut in Clifton NJ-- he has them made from a secret formula going back to the original owner and fries 'em up. You can get just plain ol' fried dog, but the Ripper is the one you really want. Cremated, or in the fry pot far too long, is an acquired taste, and seems to be acquired by very few.

No bizarre toppings, just their special relish mustard is all you ever need.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

5. I LOVE Rutt's Hut........

I would live there, if I could. I even love the Ripper. I would eat one or two every day until I died. Which would be, most likely, about three weeks after I started.

Here's a great bit about Rutt's on a truly wonderful website: http://www.hollyeats.com/RuttHut.htm

[The empressof all]

6. Rutt's is the only place to go.

Usually my third food outing whenever I'm home for a visit. First of course is White Castle (I know but I'm addicted), My second is the Three Guys in Jersey City for the finest NY pizza in the world and third is Rutt's for the Ripper. The Ripper has a following far and wide...How could you not love it?

[amerikat]

4. Hot Dog Johnny's is my NJ Favorite.

http://www.hotdogjohnny.com/shop/

and then there is Russ Ayers in Bordentown NJ that has a great hot dog sculpture.

[Stinky The Clown]

7. The best hot dog ever conceived was at a shack (literally) in Bridgeport, CT

?v=0

Hot Cars and Hot Dogs

http://www.hotdog1.com/about.htm

[Tangerine LaBamba]

10. That menu!!

A burger for $2.09.

Cherry pepper relish on the dogs.

That's the kind of place where I'd be in line every day. Every damn day. I'd insist of having my deathbed moved into the parking lot.

Thank you.

[catnhatnh]

16. I knew the place and love the photos....

especially since the newest car in the first (55/56? ford wagon) is at least 20 years older than the other shots and yet the stand changed so little....The red chevy van in the second could easily be mine....though in it's years I'm sure thousands of that color and vintage passed through.

[catnhatnh]

8. Some claim this place has the best Chili-Dog in New Hampshire...

<a href="" target="_blank"><img src="" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

Of course, I may be slightly prejudiced since my brother and I own the place...That said we serve a dog called the "Steelworker" which is our chili (Beanless with a base adapted from the filling of jamaican patties), Old Dutch deli mustard, and raw onion that bring repeat customers from Mass and Maine....

My strangest repeat customer drives me crazy. We pay $25 a gallon to a nice lady from Maine for a super relish fresh made with no preservatives with a red pepper base. He doesn't want that...his thing is a dog with cheap green relish, mayonnaise, and grill melted american white (and no yellow allowed) cheese....

Go figure....

[Tangerine LaBamba]

11. You and your brother are holy men

doing god's work. You are bringing heaven to earth.

Twenty-five bucks a gallon? With a red pepper base? How can she afford to make it so cheaply, what with the prices of red peppers these days?

See, I'd want both relishes on mine. And onions. And that chili, which makes me a little lightheaded just to think about it, and that absolutely perfect mustard.

I'm getting the shakes............................

[catnhatnh]

15. Well...commercial green relish is about $8 a gallon....

My relish lady also sells her relish at $6.00 a pint...She deals with the locals for supplies at a good price...When I order a couple gallons she can piggyback in a dozen or so pints and since I pay in advance her costs are covered going in...it works for her. Also I hold some of her business cards and flyers and pass them to customers who inquire...the flip side is she sends people to me to buy a burger or dog so as to try her relish before they buy a jar...it's a symbiotic deal.

As to the chili-dogs, I use my younger brother as a guide. During the season Jeff eats a minimum of twenty every week....he normally eats at least one each day at work to monitor quality. At least 5 days a week he takes two to go for supper. Now Jeff was a grillman for a locally famous hot dog restaurant in Connecticut before he moved up here to NH...he knows both hot dogs and chili...And the fact is he likes ours better. The week he eats less than 15 is the week I'll know we've lost it...

Edited to add: The steelworker is named after a friend (who actually is a union steelworker) originally from Jersey...after working down there for about a month last summer he was back and swore that Rutt's dogs were not how he remembered them and that he preferred ours.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

17. In school in southern Maine

in the mid-sixties, we lived in the first co-ed dorm in the US. We were in a little town - Springvale - and, believe me, things closed really early in winter, including the dining commons at our school. So we had stashes of food in our kitchens, but, still, we were youngsters smoking dope and we got hungry. Even if we'd climbed into one of the few cars we had, there was simply nowhere to go. Nothing.

But we had The Hot Dog Man. He was in a van, and he'd show up at 11 every night except Saturday. We'd fly out into the frigid weather, no coats, sometimes no shoes, our money - the dogs were thirty-five cents - in our jeans pockets, and, on that snow-covered drive that led up the hill to our dorm, we stood in line and got bright red hot dogs that had been simmering in water, with bright yellow mustard, bright green relish, and - something new to this Pennsylvania girl - celery salt.

That was all he sold - hot dogs. He was, after all, The Hot Dog Man.

No one ever took the trouble to learn his name or anything about him, but I can still hear that engine coming up the hill, I can still feel the brief warmth that enveloped me when I made it to the head of the line, and I can still see my boyfriend's face as I bit into the first one, smiling at me.

At our reunions, we still speak fondly of The Hot Dog Man, who disappeared after that one year, and we tell the students who came after us about him, as if he were some kind of mythological character.

Now, having learned about you, I am inordinately pleased to know another Hot Dog Man.

Take a bow, HDM. I'm sitting here smiling, because things do have a gorgeous way of coming around again, don't they?

[catnhatnh]

19. Thank you for the kind words...

It looks like your campus may have been up for sale 3-4 years ago...

http://www.springvaleschool.com/

the link has other links with photos if you are interested. Believe it or not, coming from Connecticut, celery salt surprised me too.

Looks like our stand is about 15 miles from your campus, or as I have learned to say, "Just up the road a piece...".

We don't make much money, so I must like the work.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

20. That was the main campus.........

We were an experimental division, separate from the main school, with out own faculty, our own living quarters, but we shared the dining commons. The school closed down sometime in the eighties - I had transferred out after our second year - and, sadly, the once-beautiful campus has simply fallen in the worst kind of disrepair.

Here's the architect's rendering of what became a simply beautiful, beautiful place -



And here's a small part of what it looked like everywhere when a band of us ventured back a few summers ago:



As I said, you're doing god's work. There is nothing in the world that compares with a good hot dog, and when you want/need one (is there a difference?), nothing else will do.

How odd that you're so close to Springvale/Sanford. When we first started there, our dorm wasn't yet ready, so we lived in a hotel on the beach in Kennebunkport, down the beach from the Walker place, built by Barbara Bush's family and where they still flock, dammit. That whole area has changed so much, but, back then, it was glorious. The hotel was torn down after we moved to our dorm (no, the demolition had been planned), but it was one of the old time grand places, and those of us were lucky enough to live there still have dreams about it. It was that kind of place.

We had our own chef, our own PASTRY CHEF, and every Friday night, we had all the steamed lobsters and fries we could eat. Every Saturday night, we selected our own strip steaks, and stood over the chef at the outdoor grill while he cooked them for us. When our pastry chef had pies cooling on a windowsill overnight, it was I who was lowered by her feet to that window from the room above, to get the pies. (We were always hungry - we were kids.) I once had a rhubarb pie go flying past my head because they thought it was cherry.

Those guys are still my friends. There's something wrong with me, I know, but, oh, how we ate at the Atlantis! Farm fresh eggs cooked to order every day. Buttermilk pancakes. Locally made preserves for our freshly baked bread that made such spectacular toast. Everything, every day, was unbelievable. We were so lucky. We still know it.

This was the Atlantis Hotel:



And when we got to our dorm, there was The Hot Dog Man.

Food - it's that incredible thread that runs through every living thing in our world. Tomorrow, I'll be telling my old pals that I found the new Hot Dog Man, and, since some of them still live in New England, I suspect they'll be hunting down the Mustang Grille.

Thanks for the memories. Thanks for picking such an absolutely vital line of work. I'm so tickled by your presence, you cannot believe.

Here's to you, HDM :toast:

[catnhatnh]

22. Great Memories and thanks for sharing....

because I CLEP'd and went to community College I ate at Tomlinson's while you apparently dined somewhat better...I'm jealous of the hotel stay.

[AwakeAtLast]

9. A lot of people think a Chicago dog is weird

But I love them!

Hot Doug's was awesome! I was not there on Friday or Saturday, so I did not get to try the Duck Fat fries :(

http://www.hotdougs.com/

[Tangerine LaBamba]

12. Always great advice:

"Keep your friends close, your sausage closer." That is a GREAT menu.

I wish I still lived in Chicago, but I'm going to be watching Bourdain's show tomorrow night, since my time in Chicago - I lived there for two years long ago - was a dazzle of really great little hole-in-the-wall restaurants. My first taste of Szechuan was at a place out on North Avenue, 'way west, that looked like a laundromat.

That was in 1971.

It's as good as San Francisco in terms of being the best eating city in the country.

[AwakeAtLast]

13. My sister lived there for about 15 years

She moved to Austin, TX last year. My visits to Chicago were filled with great food at awesome restaurants.

Now I will get to sample Austin cuisine this summer! :D

[eleny]

14. A hot dog stand located here in Colorado shaped like a frank...

It started out at a location in Denver. Then someone moved it west to Aspen Park, Co on Hwy 285. And now it's 10 miles west of there in Bailey, Co. The eats have always been tasty. There's maybe 10 seats inside.

[catnhatnh]

18. This one is for Stinky...

From the "Hot Dog Stands where we attempted to lose are virginity" series...

<a href="" target="_blank"><img src="" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

[Stinky The Clown]

21. Ah jeeeeze .....

....... I remember it all too well. Right in front of the Frisbie's Pie distribution Center or Outlet...... (Yes, Virginia, **that** that Frisbie's)

We hung for a time down the road and up the hill from there, past Howie's, at Ahern's.