2015-08-10: The Hot Doggening Pt I

Yesterday we did very little after the Nerd Night. Going out in public was not such an attractive idea. After boxing I started making a Tourist Checklist plan. Today we put that plan into action.

I made a map based on opening times and such. I may have been over confident in our eating skills but I at least planned for a recuperative stroll through the park midway.

NY is famous for hotdogs. We shall eat all the hotdogs. That Kobayashi guy can eat over 100 hotdogs in 10 minutes. He is from Nagano. We lived in Nagoya. Those place names are similar enough I figure some kind of numerology will work for us too.
I think we can eat 12 hotdogs in 12 miles in 4 hrs and 4 minutes.

I get a hotdog here everyday after boxing (mapref but he can stroll up and down Martin Luther King Dr a bit). This is the standard to beat. He makes his own chilli and he now starts making the dog when he see me approach. Most street vendors use the same brand of hotdog so the chilli / fixings is the differentiating factor. Oh and I say "dog" now I am not sure this is correct and lack the conviction to stick to it.

Creating this plan I used several websites claiming to rank the best hotdogs in NY. I read each page, correlated the opinions, verified times and looked at references for each location in articles. And I noted down what the recommended purchase was at each place.

Rules of The Hot Dog-ening

1. Must be on Manhattan Island
2. Must purchase recommended hotdog

It has flags and Lady statues but at about a million dollars a hotdog we won't visit this one today. Plus not on the island. I have a theory that the higher on Tourist Checklists the place is the higher the hotdog price is.

I probably should have checked the places actually exist, there was a reference to a place in Battery Park where some froggies are making a hotdog with good bread and tons of melted gruyere. No one in Le District knows what Le 'Otdog is or where you can get one. Even when I didn't use a silly french accent they didn't understand me.

Lots of other interesting things but we have a mission. Le Mission if you will. Ours doesn't have a nice font though, it is just scribbled notes in my backpocket.

The Revised Rules (II) Of The Hotdog-ening are:

1. Must Exist
2. Must be on the Island
3. Must purchase recommended hotdog

Paulus Hook Ferry Terminal, New Jersey. Windy. I am not sure if wind factors into the average hotdog rating.

This is your stock standard NY style street hot dog. They are not very good without chilli. I think NY people consider sauerkraut and mustard obligatory but ketchup a sign a of weak soul. He didn't have sauerkraut but he is in Jersey and so falls out of the NY standards. I think that means he would be allowed ketchup or chilli but he didn't have them either.

Excluding the post boxing hotdog from the checklist, we decided to start simple with a street dog at the dock before grabbing the ferry over to the island.

The Revised Rules (III) Of The Hot-dog-ening are:

1. Boxing hotdog totally counts in the tally
2. Must Exist
3. Can be on the Island 
4. Can be where we are right now so long as we are on the way to the island
5. Must purchase recommended hotdog

Strictly speaking Grays Papaya should be 5th on our trip but the subway lined up well for a trip to the top of the map and Ewa was already wondering how many more hot dogs we could eat.

Grays Papaya (website, mapref) is famous for The Recession Special. They are also one of several places that sells hotdogs alongside tropical fruit juices. I think there was a fad for tropical fruits at about the same time hotdogs became profitable in a store front style here, there are quite a few "hotdogs and fruit juice" places. For me the flavours aren't really good together so I skip the juices.

For cheap hotdogs these were good.The chilli was not as good as the After Boxing hotdogs but technically those ones don't count for this list. Plus those ones I am ravenous when I get there which probably counts for something.

The Recession Special has been available for decades now; $5 for 2 hotdogs and a drink. I skipped the drink and got chilli on the hotdogs which changed the price a bit. I am guessing Bill Clinton never eats here. Or if he does he just sits in the corner and glares at the owner muttering "pffft sell Recession Special during my presidency will you". I am guessing Bush would eat here but he would miss the joke.

The Revised Rules (IV) Of The Hot-dog-ening are:

1. Boxing hotdog totally counts in the tally
2. Must Exist
3. Can be on the Island 
4. Can be where we are right now so long as we are on the way to the island
5. Should purchase recommended hotdog 
6. If recommended purchase is a Value For Money deal can add tasty things to it

Shake Shack is wildly popular. I think it is an Actual Tourist Place. Either that or we got there later than we expected. They have different queues for what you want to order in an attempt to streamline things. Doesn't work. I think we waited about half an hour for hot dogs.

The length of the wait means I skipped the recommended item and got one of each of the basic types. One of them was the recommended item but I forget which one. We agree the chicago style hotdog is the best.They call it a Shack Cago Dog though. Puns are awful.

We discussed these dogs. At about $4 each is one of these better than 2 chilli dogs from Grays Papaya? In the case of the Chicago Dog maybe. The wait time is a deal breaker for me though.
Plus my After Boxing Dogs are only a buck each and they are the best so far "value for money" wise and second only to the Chicago Dog flavourwise. But I am not sure I could eat 4 of them.

Fairly sure that is the Ghostbusters building. Diversions and digressions are acceptable. Didn't have enough hairspray for a decent Sigourney impression though. If I move to New York I will start a business selling props for tourist location photo ops. Red dresses and hairspray? we would have bought some.

When I said I wasn't sure I could eat 4 chilli dogs after boxing the goal of eating 12 hotdogs was called into question. Further evidence was presented where the original 12 hotdogs in the evening was based on one hotdog at each location, a rule we have already strayed from.

The Revised Rules (V) Of The Hotdogening are:

1. Boxing hotdog totally counts in the tally
2. Must Exist
3. Can be on the Island 
4. Can be where we are right now so long as we are on the way to the island
5. Should purchase recommended hotdog 
6. If recommended purchase is a Value For Money deal can add tasty things to it
7. Are not limited purely to the recommended purchase

We strolled through Central Park because it is a Checklist item. Not because we were full of hot dogs at all.

A quick constitutional through the park and the inevitable getting lost, getting side tracked and so on had us in the mood for a HotDog. Fortunately I knew of a nearby location. I got lost on the way there but that just added to the hunger which, being the best sauce, meant these would surely be great hotdogs. They even have a froggy name! Epicerie Boulud! (mapref, website)

Actually I think beer is the best sauce. Most places didn't serve beer. Froggies at least are aware that beer should be provided in all settings. Good froggies.

The problem with Froggies, I find, is that they don't understand the quintessential nature of trashy food. Fresh salad, good bread, even a reasonable piece of meat (despite being in tubular form). Dijonaise style mustardy sauce. All of these things are great. But they are not a hotdog. 

The Revised Rules (VI) Of The Hot Dog En Ing are:

1. Boxing hotdog totally counts in the tally
2. Must Exist
3. Can be on the Island 
4. Can be where we are right now so long as we are on the way to the island
5. Should purchase recommended hotdog 
6. If recommended purchase is a Value For Money deal can add tasty things to it
7. Are not limited purely to the recommended purchase
8. Can totally quit halfway through, pretend that true research takes longer than a single evening.

Results of Round One 

• Post Boxing Street Dog: First Round Knockout!
  
• Ferry Terminal Dog: Good to set a low standard at the beginning, last.
  
• Le District Chien: I imagine it was good when it existed, if it had been last of the evening it would rank highly as imagination wouldn't have filled my stomach any further.
  
• Grays Juiceless: Loses on taste and cheapness to the boxing dog.
  
• Shakey Word Play: They have this whole California Dream theme but their best dog is from Pole infested Chicago. Poles couldn't afford it, but it is good.
  
• Froggy Fancy Boy: Froggies should not go local. Do steak frites, don't do them in a bun.
  

Rating: 6/12 (except with the revised rules it might be 9/9 the math is tricky)