Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Rafiqi's $0.99 Grilled Hot Dog


Yesterday I was in the Flatiron area: in the Home Depot for some wooden mixing sticks that I needed to get for one of my college courses. The wooden sticks were free, so on my way to the checkout I spotted one of those proctologist-style pen lights and grabbed/purchased one since I had some extra cash to burn since I did not had to pay for the mixing sticks. On my way out, I decided to grab something to eat for cheap. I was walking near the 2 Bros Pizza that was right across from the now-defunct American Apparel discount stores, but the line was just too fucking-long for me to stand in: there were bunch of people inside the joint and maybe 4-6 people outside, so I opted out of 2 Bros Pizza. When I came to intersection of 5th Avenue and 23rd Street, I spotted a couple of carts that were selling $0.99 hot dogs; one of which was Rafiqi's, so I made a decision to grab a hot dog there.



While I was waiting in line, in front of some hipster girl that was chatty and anxious about couscous, tajine and the vegetables, I spotted this neat cut and ground frying pan that was used for catching the shaved lamb meat.



I also spotted a bunch of wieners grilling on the flat grill. The grill as you can see was nice and greasy.



The guy that was making the hot dog put some mustard and ketchup even though I did not asked for it, I did not object to it either. Lots of carts in the city charge extra $0.25 for a topping, but in most places mustard and ketchup are free and only toppings like relish and onion sauce cost the extra quarter. Like I said, I did not mind the toppings, but the dude went a bit too far with ketchup and pretty much flooded it like it was a gyro and like he was pouring down white sauce on it. After I took the hot dog into my hands and began walking away from the cart, a dollop of ketchup and mustard fell down right on my freshly-washed shirt and made a mess on it, now I gotta roll-out the washing machine and wash it again. The hot dog itself was pretty average: it was grilled, but not enough that the juices were flowing out of the wiener. The bun was your average bun: slightly warm but nothing other than this. At some carts they press the bun to the grill and I like how it toasts the insides of it. Overall it was a decent hot dog for $1.00, but nothing special; just an average grilled dog. I rate it at 3.7/5.0 and 4.2/5.0 for the value

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