Howard Johnson's Hot Dog

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Hoffman

Growing up my Howard Johnson's food was the frankfurter topped with their brown mustard and the relish, both of which were placed on the table in a rack holding two glass jars with serving spoons in each glass-topped container. It never occurred to my family to order the fried clams because we had plenty of those that I dug from the sandbars in front of our cottage, or from clam shacks all around us.

The real reason we'd go to Howard Johnson's was because my father loved the butter pecan ice cream. And ice cream and coffee was all he ever ordered there. Me, I was always looking for the pieman.

By the way, the two restaurants we most frequented were both on the Boston Post Road (U.S. 1), one in Branford, the other in Milford.

Years later, I was driving in the Houston area and spotted a Howard Johnson's restaurant across a grassy median on Bellaire Boulevard (I have no idea how I can remember the damned street) and I turned around at the next cut-through to get back. One look at the menu and I, having been in clam-deprived Texas for a while, ordered the fried clams and a couple of frankfurters. When the clams came I asked what they were. I'd never seen clams that looked like that. They were what I later learned were clam strips. I asked the waitress what they did with the rest of the clam and she hadn't a clue as to what I meant. The things were tough as shoe leather and tasted about as much like a fried clam as does shoe leather. Almost as bad, the frankfurters were cold, the mustard was yellow, and the hot dog buns were side-cut buns that hadn't even been toasted.

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Hoffman

I see you're from Westbrook. Are the Castlebrook Inn and Eddie Rahm's still on the beach there?