Banker's hours

"I'm beginning to think Hot Doug's is stupid." - Bob M.

This was posted on my Facebook page a few days ago, a frustrated lament from a friend of mine, and fellow fan of Hot Doug's. I hate to say it, but I'm starting to agree with him. And it isn't because I don't love the food. The combination of sriracha hot sauce and seaweed salad on a Thai chicken sausage is one of those middle-of-the-night encased meat epiphanies that happen but once in a lifetime.

Nope. It's the hours that are killing me. I wanted to go to Hot Doug's over the holidays and when I checked the website, it said "Closed until January 6th." The guy's taking a vacation? People in the restaurant business don't take vacations. They grind themselves down to nubs, working 23 hours a day, napping on their kitchen floors for the 24th, until the morning prep staff arrives (and people wonder why chefs yell). They don't take vacations, and if they do, they don't close while they're doing it.

But I guess when you're Doug, you can. When Anthony Bourdain tells people to go eat your meat, you can go to Saint Tropez and wear a thong for two weeks, and your business probably won't be the worse for it. Some guys have all the luck.

But then there's Great Lake Pizza and Edzo's. I'm adding them to the Stupid List, and here's why. Because when I found out Hot Doug's was closed, I decided to go to Edzo's instead. It's a new burger place in my hood, and it is to burgers what Hot Doug's is to dogs: a foodie-worthy fast food joint. The meat is double ground in house, and the fries comes in beguiling flavors, Taylor Street Italian (Italian beef gravy and peppers) promising to be the most life changing.

Well, when I checked Edzo's website, it, too, was closed for the holidays. How can a place that's only been open for two months - and only open for lunch - already take a closing vacation? I smelled trust fund, I smelled sugar daddy, I smelled bank robbery. Maybe Ed doesn't need the cash. Maybe all he needs is lunch.

Which leaves us with perhaps the stupidest of them all - Great Lake Pizza. Esquire Magazine called Great Lake the "Best Pizza in the Country," better even than Pizzeria Bianco. If you have paged through this blog, you'll know that I spent a total of 27 hours waiting for pizza from that Phoenix establishment. No dice. I returned empty-handed.

But it isn't the wait that gets me. God knows, I've waited, and will continue to wait, for anything that redefines its own category. It's the operating hours. They are as follows: Wednesday through Saturday, 5:30 - 9:30. That's it. Four hours, four days of delicious pizza a week. They're open for 16 hours a week.

That's part time.

When I worked in restaurants, we laughed at people who worked banker's hours. Pussies. And now, not only are these places working banker's hours, they're making more money doing it. They're getting write-up's and buzz and long lines. It's the exclusivity club. Soon, these places are going to require top secret passwords to get in.

Am I still interested in going? Does Hot Doug make duck fat fries on Friday? Hell, yeah, he does.

You're a shining star

I had lunch at Hot Doug's today, and boy, was my sausage motherfucking hot. It had that cumulative kind of heat that follows you out of the restaurant and then clings to you like a cranky, overheated child all the way home. And I mean that in the best possible sense.

I've eaten at Hot Doug's once before, and much preferred the Celebrity Sausage this time around: the Verdine White. I'm obviously not up on my obscure celebrities because I had to google this one. Verdine is the bassist for Earth, Wind & Fire, known for his high-energy dancing, and judging from the pictures, his beadazzled bellbottomed jumpsuits. What Verdine has in common with spicy Thai chicken sausage with garlic chili mustard and sesame seaweed salad is beyond me, but you gotta love a place that names a quasi-Asian sausage after a black guy named Verdine. I believe this particular taste sensation has had other celebrity names, but I'm glad it was Verdine today. Earth, Wind & Fire is in my top ten secret favorite groups, along with The Babys and Pablo Cruise. The other seven are super duper top secret and none of your business.

The wait this time was less than 10 minutes, likely because of the crappy weather and the fact that it's Thursday, and not Duck Fat Fries Friday or Saturday. My dining companion (my husband) had two dogs: a regular char dog with everything and a Keira Knightley char dog (mighty hot!) with everything. Doug offers free refills on small sodas, so I ended up downing a good 64 ounces of pop just to keep my mouth from going up in flames.

There seems to be an arbitrary pricing policy, with Doug himself deciding if you deserve a price cut. On my last visit, I reminded Doug that we had once known each other in grade school, and I think he lopped off 25%. Today, I remained a stranger and paid regular price. But now I have an excuse to go for a third time: the Dave Kingman (a chicken Italian sausage with everything!) and another chance to play my I-used-to-know-you-in-grade-school card. We'll see what happens.

Rosemary-scented victory

 

Apparently, the magic hour is 11:20. That's when I arrived at Hot Doug's on Friday to find a medium-short line, similar to the one above. I've decided that the waiting part, or the 'pre-meal' as I will now call it, is akin to waiting for your meal at an ordinary restaurant, except that you haven't ordered yet. And you're standing outside. A stretch, I know, but you have to come up with some semi-credible explanation as to why you're waiting in a line this long for a hot dog. 

Forty minutes later, I ordered the Sandra Chase, which was "Today's Celebrity Sausage." I have to confess: I have no idea who Sandra Chase is, so I googled her. There's a Sandra Chase who has a homeopathic medical practice in Fairfax, Virginia, and another with a general dentistry practice in San Diego. A different Sandra Chase gave $1250 in political contributions in 2008, but to which candidate, only Sandra Chase knows for sure. I should have asked, "To which Sandra Chase are you referring?" because if my sausage had been named after Sandra Chase, the one-armed albino serial killer, or Sandra Chase, the pathological liar, I might have chosen the Dave Kingman (my friend, Bob's, choice) or the Keira Knightley (mighty hot!) instead.  

Sandra Chase, the sausage, was a rosemary-smoked chicken sausage with rosemary-garlic mustard and caruchon cheese, which is a fancy sheep's milk cheese from France (had to look that one up). It tasted better than it looked. I think it's fair to say that all sausages fall into the "has a great personality" category. Sausages do not possess the physical beauty of, say, a ripe peach. When someone says, "That's a good-lookin' sausage," what they really mean is, "I've had a few beers, and by a few, I mean 27." 

Bob and I shared some duck fat fries, which, ironically, were good lookin', and tasted good lookin', too, although I don't think I could tell the difference between duck fat fries and non duck fat fries in a blind taste test. 

We paid $10 for the meal and at first, I thought it was because I know Doug. Well, I used to know Doug, back in grade school. He was my brother's friend, and I have a distinct memory of all of us, with the addition of their friend, Ziggy, standing around in my kitchen while Ziggy put the needle nose pliers into an electrical socket. We all lived. But, no, the cheap meal was not an isolated incident of post-electrocution favoritism. Doug likes to make up prices as he goes along. So if he charges you $75, figure it's because he doesn't like you. 

Hot Doug's, the Sausage Superstore. Worth the Wait.   

Hot Doug's - back at it

After the Pizzeria Bianco fiasco (see former posts), you'd think I would have learned my lesson regarding long lines and food pilgrimages. But seeing that I've been wanting to try Hot Doug's for years, it seems crazy to throw in the towel at this point. Besides, I'm getting good at this. If waiting in line for food becomes an endurance sport, I want to be its most accomplished athlete. 

So I've cleared the calendar and I'm heading back tomorrow with the same friend who accompanied me on my first fruitless trip. I'm sure Bob and I will have the same endless argument we had the last time: which chocolate is better, milk or bittersweet? The obvious answer here is bittersweet. It's kind of a no brainer. But many fine points can be made either way and that should carry us through the hour or so wait. Let's just hope it doesn't get so heated that we come to blows. 

I fished around on the internet and found the above picture. Can I be frank? It looks like the cat rejected its Friskies Buffet on top of that sausage. Maybe it's just an unflattering picture. Maybe the lighting was all wrong. How many of us are truly photogenic? On the other hand, maybe it's just an ugly sausage that tastes damn good. I'm so willing to concede that.   

The next Hot Doug's post will be a clear and detailed account of encased meats, duck fries, long waits, arguments about chocolate, and the winner of those arguments. I promise you, I will not come back empty handed. 

Waiting for a Hot Dog

It's 10:30 in the morning and I'm making myself a hot dog. My favorite way, the Franksville way, is a boiled hot dog on a poppyseed bun with melted cheese (think processed cheese food, like Velveeta) and chopped onions. I like the kind of onions that have lost their mojo from sitting around, aerating too long (think onions at a ball park concession stand). It's an acquired taste. 

I probably have hot dogs on the brain because last Saturday, I went to Hot Doug's with my friend, Bob, my daughter, Chloe, and Bob's absurdly large Irish Wolfhound, Georgia, and all we did was wait in line.  For over an hour. For a hot dog. (see all the other obsessed hot dog stalkers in line with us, above) The crazy thing was, we never even made it inside the door. We were still at least 20 people back when we threw in the towel, after standing an hour and ten minutes with a small child and a large dog who kept sticking her curious, well-meaning nose into the butt of a crotchety guy standing in front of us. Chloe had a playdate and we had to get going. 

To be fair, the line wasn't just for hot dogs. It was also for duck fat fries. And the myriad exotic encased meats that Doug, of Hot Doug's, has to offer. I just checked today's specials online and if I went right now, I could get a Thai Chicken Sausage with Sriracha Mustard and Sesame-Seaweed Salad. Or a Spinach and Feta Gyros Sausage with Tapenade Mayonnaise and Kasseri Cheese. I love it that Doug doesn't mix his metaphors. If you're going to be Thai, be Thai! If you're going to be Greek, be Greek! Too many chefs want to cross too many borders and bring too many cuisines together like they're cooking at the United Nations.  

But if I went today, I couldn't get the duck fat fries. They're a Friday and Saturday only proposition. So I will be going back, just not on a Saturday. I've made food pilgrimages before. And after giving it a great deal of thought, I've decided that waiting for hours for a one-of-a-kind, inventive, incredibly delicious item is totally within my comfort zone. It's waiting at a place like Red Lobster that I have a problem with.