Along with every other family around, we’ve been enjoying Mo Willems’s books about The Pigeon. The first installment, Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, is about how you should not let the pigeon drive the bus. The second book, Iris’s favorite, is called The Pigeon Finds a Hot Dog. It’s about…okay, I’ll stop now.
Anyway, Iris and I were reading _The Pigeon Finds a Hot Dog_ for the zillionth time, and I realized that Iris had never had a hot dog. This would have to be rectified. We got some hot dogs and had them for lunch, and Iris loved it, of course. Who wouldn’t love a hot dog? We had to cut Iris’s hot dog into pieces too small to be a choking hazard, but she had a great time stuffing the pieces into the bun, which she called “hot dog bread.”
In New York, there’s a place called Papaya King that’s been at Third Avenue and 86th since 1932. It’s the place featured on Seinfeld where Kramer gets a hot dog. I’ve only been there once, but it has spawned a dozen imitators in the tropical drinks and hot dogs genre. For some reason, the imitators are all called things like Frank’s Papaya and Gray’s Papaya, not things like Papaya Duke and Papaya Viscount. All of them have the same shtick, which involves playing up the health benefits of papaya drinks. None of them play up the health benefits of hot dogs. I never compared side-by-side, but I thought the dogs at our local papaya stand on the Upper West Side, which I think was Mike’s Papaya, were indistinguishable from the King’s.
In 1999, two hot dogs and a papaya drink at Mike’s were $2. Good times.
The papaya stands start out with good all-beef hot dogs, but their greatness lies in the cooking method. They roll the dogs around on a hot griddle all day. The longer the frank stays on the grill, the crustier and better it gets. I realize this is unnervingly similar to the 7-Eleven hot dog rolling machine.
Most people boil or grill hot dogs at home (or maybe microwave them these days), but the papaya method is the way to go. Heat a skillet (cast iron or stainless works better than nonstick, because the dogs won’t stay put on nonstick) over medium-low to medium with the barest sheen of vegetable oil. Put in the dogs and roll them occasionally until they’re crusty all over. This will take at least ten minutes. To warm the buns, I open them and nestle them over the dogs until the bun is a little toasted on the edge that hits the pan. Ten-cent supermarket buns really can’t be beat here.
What’s the best brand of dog? I think all of the major kosher beef dogs are fine, but my favorite (which I tried based on a recommendation in a freebie issue of The Rosengarten Report) is Boar’s Head. You want the skinny all-beef dogs with natural casings.
Cook the Boar’s Head hot dogs in true papaya fashion, and you will be forever known as the Papaya Marquess.
there is a guy now at the ballard sunday market selling boar’s head dogs- not sure how he cooks them though, will have to check next week.
My wife and I love the method for cooking hotdogs used by some of the street vendors in Vancouver. They slash the slightly par-boiled dog at a diagonal about every half inch across and about 2/3rds through. It’s then grilled over hot coals, and the resulting char permeates the dog due to the slashes. It’s served on a grilled bun with your choice of condiments. We then share it so we have room for dinner at Vj’s. By the way, could you please use your influence to encourage someone to open a Vj’s type restaurant in Seattle? And an Imperial Gardens in downtown Seattle should do great also. Otherwise, our dining scene finally is wonderful.
That sounds great, Bob. If I had any Vij influence I would have used it already, but it only takes Armandino to make a Salumi, so maybe it’ll happen someday.