50 Wurst Dates

What is a guy supposed to write about hot dogs that hasn’t already been written, rewritten, torn up, published, eaten by a dog, vomited back up again, been rolled into a tube, dragged through the garden, and then to add insult to injury, had ketchup added to it?

Why not start with a sentence/paragraph of nonsense?

Job well done, Jim.

So I didn’t really have any idea of a starting point for this article. All I really had were the things I’ve known all my adult life which are 1) no ketchup, 2) natural casing is better, and 3) ignore rules 1 and 2 if you feel like it. Sometimes you just want a cheap chili cheese dog, or that one they used to have at Sonic with the barbecue sauce and bacon bits on it which was objectively awful by any standard AND YET load that thing up with onions and POW.

So I’ve taken my stunningly beautiful (and more patient than average, probably) wife Mindy on a number of hot dog “dates” over the past couple of weeks.

Date #1: Demon Dawgs

If you’re a fella of a certain age like I am, the name of this place probably makes you think of Saturday mornings in the early ’80s

Demon Dawgs popped up a couple of years ago in an old A&W drive-in style building in Alsip, IL. It’s got that classic drive-in look down pat–no servers zooming around on rollerskates (at least not on the chilly November afternoon when we visited) but some vintage booths, posters, and a classic jukebox, as well as checkerboards on the tables.

We were actually on our way somewhere else when we called an audible to stop here and try them out. I’d heard shortly after they opened that they weren’t very good, so I’d been avoiding trying the place. I feel a little sheepish now. We ordered a Demon Dawg to split, which is their version of the classic stripped down Chicago-style “Depression dog“–not the dragged-through-the-garden one with the tomatoes and everything, just mustard, onions, pickle relish, and sport peppers. The hot dog came wrapped in wax paper with fries, though the fries were not packed in tightly on top of the dog as is common with this style.

These fries may not have been the absolute best thing we tried while on this quest, but they were one hell of a tough act to follow. I don’t know if it was a fluke that day, but Demon Dawgs put maybe the best order of fries I’ve had in my life in front of me that day.

The hot dog was also good–natural casing, plenty of snap, good balance of condiments. Those fries, though. Damn. We’ll be back soon.

Date #2: Fat Johnnie’s

Fat Johnnie’s is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it shack on the side of busy Western Avenue on the south side of Chicago, festooned with hand-written signs and featuring a tiny order window that puts you at eye level with the cook’s belt buckle. Yet this tiny place has drawn a good deal of media attention, including Anthony Bourdain in his Chicago episode of No Reservations and a the #1 spot on The Daily Meal’s America’s 50 Best Hot Dogs list for its Mighty Dog.

I had to try that Mighty Dog, which turns out to be a hybrid of the Chicago Dog and a Mother-In-Law–a hot dog and tamale, together in a bun, with chili, cheese, and the full dragged-through-the-garden treatment. At Fat Johnnie’s, they use a fat slab of fresh cucumber instead of a dill pickle, which makes the “salad in a bun” descriptor even more appropriate.

We also tried the Super Dog, which is a chili cheese dog dragged through the garden.

And of course we had to get the classic Chicago Dog

The Mighty Dog and Super Dog are sloppy messes (tasty sloppy messes, but also indulgent and unnecessary ones), but the Chicago Dog just works, as has been noted before, and the fresh cucumber almost makes it seem healthy. We liked it so well we immediately went back and got a second one.

Date #3: A Fancy Party at a Chinese Restaurant?

Friends of the Tribunal J.P. Graziano’s were throwing a party at their new neighboring restaurant 2Fun Chinese Saturday night, so the wife and I got gussied up and went out on the town. We started with a couple of cocktails at Lone Wolf Tavern–I had the Stone and Plume, a combination of scotch, CH distillery‘s Fernet Dogma (a local take on Fernet-Branca) and apricot that reminded me of nothing more than a chocolate orange, and Mindy tried another cocktail that I don’t see in their online menu, but involved grapefruit. We sat in a corner and enjoyed killing some time together before heading to the main event.

At 2Fun Chinese, we were treated to some even more interesting cocktails. Mindy ordered the Oolong Island Iced Tea, which combined 4 tea-infused liqueurs with a splash of coke and popping boba balls and I ordered the Open Says Me, containing sesame gin, coconut milk, ginger, and lime. Both were delightful–mine tasted like boozy Thai food, and the boba balls in Mindy’s gave the impression of little grape skins filled with champagne, though I’m sure the science behind them would tell a different story. While we drank, we were presented with a series of small plates (paper boats, really, but nice ones) with various dishes including Sichuan chiccharones, sesame chicken wings, pork ribs, fried rice, pickled cucumbers, and some very nice pork belly buns.

It was a great time with even better hosts (and some drink-mixing theatrics from our bartender) and in addition to Jim Graziano, we got to chat with his sister DeAna and my curmudgeonly Twitter pal @kennethaz. All told, a great evening.

What? No hot dogs? How does this one even count?

Date #3b4: Gene’s & Jude’s

We left 2Fun Chinese fairly stuffed (and hoping to return soon!), but Mindy was a good sport and accompanied me to a classic Chicagoland joint I’d been wanting to try, Gene’s & Jude’s Hot Dogs.

At this time of night, navigating the parking lot was like playing drunk Frogger, and once inside, you needed to ask someone where the randomly coiling line began and ended. The kids working there kept things moving fairly briskly though, and all told we only spent about 20 minutes waiting. Long enough to get this shot of their trophy wall.

Gene’s & Jude’s also gets a lot of press accolades, including being voted the best hot dog in America by Rachel Ray’s Hot Dog bracket back in 2011. Mindy ordered a hot dog with everything but peppers, and I got a double dog with everything.

Gene’s & Jude’s fries up a pretty serious potato, and packs the fries in on top of each dog they sell in the classic presentation of the Chicago “Depression Dog” style, resulting in fries that taste variously of mustard, sport peppers, onions, pickle relish, or some combination thereof. They’re seriously great fries (though we had to give the edge to the ones we had at Demon Dawgs that day–how did those sneak up on us?) and you have to get through a pile of them to get a glimpse of your hot dog. By that time, you might not even want the sausage anymore, but it’s worth it. The fries tend to smush down and spread out the bun a bit, but they keep everything nice and warm for you, which is nice on a chilly November night when you’re eating in the car.

Date #5: a solo lunch (sad trombone)

Well I couldn’t exactly write this without trying a more typical version of the Chicago style hot dog, and it so happens that Luke’s Italian Beef near my office serves one that fits right into the mold. I stopped in for a late lunch during work one day and scurried back to my office to eat at my desk like the sad lonely cubicle monkey I am.

This one ticked off all the little checkboxes. Poppy seed bun. Onions. Mustard. Neon green relish. Tomato. Sport peppers. A big fat pickle wedge. Sure, the dog could have been a little snappier but overall it was a solid rendition. For some reason, though, I just didn’t enjoy it as much as I had any of the others.

I think maybe eating hot dogs is more fun when you do it with someone you love.

I’m going to need to take Mindy on a lot more hot dog dates to get the the 50 that were promised in the title of this post, but I think before then I might owe her a nice dinner somewhere fancy. Thanks for being such a good sport about this, babe, and thanks for spending all this time with me the past couple of weeks.