It’s Christmas Eve. Rather than get in the Christmas spirit by listening to Christmas music, baking cookies, and stuffing socks full of useless trinkets, I am choosing to write about a hot dog. The story of this hot dog, in my opinion, truly embodies the spirit of Christmas. It all began on a Saturday morning. I had purchased a Santa suit in preparation to run a 4 mile race called the jingle bell jog, where my plan was to don the suit and attempt to make it across the finish line with my coworkers. Given that I write about a hot dog once a week, y’all know I can’t be in great shape. Well, Saturday morning race day comes along, and I wake up to multiple missed calls and texts. It is 10 minutes to race time and there is no way I make it to Brooklyn on time. Epic fail. Rather than stay in and sulk, however, I make it out to Brooklyn to participate in the post race bar crawl. Part of that bar crawl took place at a bar called the Bearded Lady, which, by some sort of Christmas miracle, served hot dogs. Santa is real, and he presented me with this gift even though I was a bad boy. No coal this time, just a weenie for me. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas, indeed.
Behold the Chicago dog. As I’ve mentioned before, Chicago dogs are great, but usually mood weenies. What is a mood weenie? Every once in a while, you get in a strange mood and crave chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream, right? Imagine that chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream is a Chicago dog. It’s not your go-to, but when you’re in a weird mood, it’s money. Luckily, given the events of the morning prior, I was in a weird mood, and a Chicago dog called my name. Chicago dogs are essentially gardens on top of sausages. You have your tomatoes, pickles, onions, peppers, and most importantly mustard. My favorite part about the Chicago dog is the way the yellow mustard (always yellow, obviously) interacts with the pickle to form this graceful, harmonious marriage that is most definitely legal everywhere in the US except for Alabama.
Now, remember, we are in Brooklyn, so this is not a traditional Chicago dog. We have here a very thin toasted bun which allows for emphasis on the toppings. The toppings are diced up and covered in black pepper, which is very rare for a Chicago dog. In fact, I’ve never seen this before. It is almost as if there is some form of pico de gallo adorning the sausage. I have to say it works very well. Then, the weenie itself. Let me give a shout out again to the Brooklyn Hot Dog Co, serving up another delicious sausage. They are long, tasty, and of incredible quality. I still long for a little more snap, but definitely some of the best sausages around. This is a very bold weenie, at a very bold place, with very bold cocktails. I highly recommend both the bar and the hot dog they serve. If you’re ever near Prospect Park, this is a great rest stop to shoot some pool and enjoy a cocktail and a dog.
3.5 weenies
Now, in honor of Christmas, a poem. This is a mashup of some of your favorite Christmas hits, entitled “Hot Dogs for Thee”.
“On Dasher, on Dancer, on Schnippers, Papaya
On Comet and Cupid, The Cannibal and Rudy’s
A hot dog comes for thee, oh yum yum yum yum
A king weenie we seek, oh yum yum yum yum
Deck the halls with loads of weenies
Fatty fatty fat, we get so fat
A hot dog comes for thee, oh yum yum yum yum
A king weenie we seek, oh yum yum yum yum”
From the middle of my heart (the bottom makes no sense), thanks for all of the support in 2015. See you in 2016, as there are still many weenies to try! God bless you all and have a wonderful holiday!
Cheers
nyweenies 