The best hot dog in the world is on the street in the City of Light. They take a smallish loaf of French bread, put two hot dogs plus great grated French cheese inside, plus mustard, if you wish. And then they mush it for a while in a hot sandwich-musher machine. Oo-la-la!

And, for the record, the worst hot dog I ever had was in Yankee Stadium, circa 1976.

There's this one street with a... variety of items grilled on a stick:

- Chicken

- Pork

- Squid

- Baby octopus

- Semi-fermented smelly tofu (actually pretty good)

- Silkworm in pupa stage

- Centipede

I was only half-done with my tofu before I spotted those last two items... made it a little harder to finish. :)

Keith! You continue to churn out phenomenal comics. Just when you seemed to be veering off into terminal daddydom, you pen a winner.

My fave: Lamb shawarma in the "Honch", Yokosuka, Japan. Nothing like it at 2 in the morning.

Tuber Grub on a stick in Abidjan perhaps? The best pork free pizza in Kuala Lampur?

Near Lake Turkana, Kenya, 1992.

I passed on the kidneys- that's for the elders, anyway.

Picture this:

3 am, totally shit faced after drinking all night with the boys on Rush St. in the Near North neighborhood of Chicago. What do I _HAVE_ to have? A dozen sliders from White Castle. Then it's home to the then girlfriend now wife who is totally pissed at me. Not because I'm drunk, not because its now almost 4 am and she has to be up to go to work in a couple of hours, and not because I was making out with some woman I met at the bar. No, She is pissed because I did not bring home any sliders for her.

I've been from San Diego to New York, Atlanta to Miami. I've never seen anything like the things described. I've seen undercooked meat, buns with too much water on them (there shouldn't be any), weiners with less than ten percent meat of indeterminate origin, and mustard that tastes worse than canary yellow paint.

Maybe what you guys are praising is the lube factor. I just ate at a highly-praised Greek restaurant. What is the content of Greek food, mostly? Olive oil. My toilet and I have become very close friends, very suddenly. Maybe all that burnt fat is what you crave, instead of the quasi-refined crude the restaurant slapped on my salad, meat and ice cream.

...make you think aany food tastes better. Paris, and a street hot dog? You ate a street dog in Paris? Did you notice that you were in PARIS, fergawshsakes???

In Rochester, NY you want to hit & Court streets, across Court from B&L, and get whatever Dave slings at you.

Food that tastes good in Rochester, outdoors, in the third week of March, now THAT is good food, my friends!

that should be "STONE & Courts streets"

sadly, are subjected to tasteless crap instead of real food.

For real good "Street Meat" go to a little place called Akalways in Johannesburg, on Nugget Street. That street is probably the most seedy place in South Africa, but the food sort of makes up for it.

I was in the Navy, and forced to attend a dietary class, being a little overweight (now I am out, and a *lot* overweight).

The dietician was telling us how to choose healthy options from the sea-going menu, and I raised my hand and asked, "What about a broiled hot-dog, sliced down the middle with a piece of cheese inside, and wrapped with an undercooked slice of bacon?" She looked horrified, and said, "They serve *that*?" Everyone nods. Ah, good times.

And the Navy sliders did slide-- broiled hamburgers (a lot of broiling on submarines) double-stacked: nice and greasy: slip right down!

It is a fiction that this type of food causes obesity and heart disease, as eloquently implied by the cartoon.

If you ate NOTHING but this kind of food you would be deficient in some nutrients, but you would not gain weight and your blood lipid profiles would normalize. You would also not kill your kidneys. Just ask anyone who has been successful on a low-carbohydrate diet like Atkins.

However in most of the western world it can be hard to find meats that are raised with natural food, no hormones and antibiotics, and raised and killed humanely. That's your health problem there.

Meat on a stick, throughout Manhattan, as well as a Hebrew National that can somehow keep you going all day...

Sofie's cart at 17th and JFK in Philly, where dogs, keilbasa, and hot sausages are charred on a flat grill making every day taste like a July 4th BBQ...

Spiro's at 3rd and Market where you can get your cheese streak with provolone for only $3.50...

I'm on a Vatican vegan diet . Blogging is very sedentary and fattening.

I heard your Hof-Brau House has free, fat free, bratwurst sausages?

Please give me seven cans of sugar free Fanta Orange drinks.

I'll COD one hot dog meat sausage to the sage pope pontiff?

When I meet the pope in April, I'll burp up seven root beers?

The left-over sodas and a dozen hot dogs? I'll send to GWB?

Berryessa, San Jose. From the roach coach, of course. Damn fine food, that, as a converted vegetarian, I am not likely to eat soon again, dammit.

Pax

Keef -

If you ever end up in DC, don't pass up the classic "Half Smoke" street sausage - it's your direct culinary connect to the Washington Senators, George Pelicanos, Chuck Brown, Bad Brains (HR might be a Vegan, but I saw Darryl Jennifer wolf one down back in the day...), the Mayor For Life, and all good things wierd and wild in the district before gentrification.

Have it with a bag of Old Bay crab chips on the side.

If you're ever in Tucson (lucky you), visit El Guero Canelo for a Sonoran hot dog: a grilled hot dog wrapped in bacon and served with chopped tomatoes and onion, cheese, salsa and a side of rice and beans. Sabroso!