Howard Johnson's Hot Dog

One of my favorite treats in the 50's was being taken to the Howard Johnson's near New Brunswick NJ and having that hotdog in the square, push it as you eat it, roll, Anyone else miss the orange roof hotdogs with their toasted rolls?
leethebard

I certainly remember Howard Johnson's frankfurters, but I have no idea what you mean by a "square, push it as you eat it roll." The only buns I remember were the New England-style top-split buns.

Didn't they come in cardboard sleeves?

If you're talking about the open-ended pasteboard half-box thing they served the dogs in, they're still around in New England, mostly at older ice cream stands and clam shacks. And yes, the rolls are grilled.

you can get them from mansfield paper co their called a 51/4 glued end hot dog tray

how did you get the name asphalt?

HoJo in Bangor Maine is one of the few (if not last) that still has a restaurant.

I remember the hot dogs but my favorite was the tendersweet fried clams. And the corn toasties for breakfast. They had pretty good onion rings too.

quote:

Originally posted by CCinNJ

HoJo in Bangor Maine is one of the few (if not last) that still has a restaurant.

I wonder if it is successful...do supplies come from Howard Johnson...and if yes to both...then why aren't there others??????????

Lee,

It's a rather complicated story. Check Wikipedia to get the skinny on the hotel chain, the three remaining restaurants, and efforts to revive the restaurants.

I'd be interested to know what hot dog they used. Gosh knows I had plenty of them. Perhaps something from the Boston area, as the company has its roots in Massachusetts. I think I remember the New England bun from childhood. Howard Johnson's had to have been the only place in N.J. to see such a bun. Quite exotic back in the day.

The Bear

Sometimes when restaurants hire, sell, or turn over their rights, vision and decision making to large restaurant management organizations, strange things happen. Visions gets skewed. Powers that be disagree of a plan to revive a once very popular concept. It becomes bottom-line profit results only. Do now or die quickly. It become even more complicated when companies replace companies and it is all back to the drawing board, with yet another master plan.

There is a delicate formula of balancing the revitalization of a once popular concept, and enhancing the concept with marketing and advertising strategy that "works" in a modern world. What stays? What goes?

I assume that all of current locations that operate, are responsible for their own supplies.

"Each of them was a former franchised restaurant from the original Howard Johnson's company".

I do not know the source, from the Wiki article.

I grew up on HoJo's (hot dogs, fried clams, chicken croquettes, and 28 flavors of ice cream!). I loved the sleeved split-top buns (so much so that we looked into using them in our shop) and how they tasted buttered and grilled (we called them white-sides). Friendly's used them as well. (Do they now?)
The dogs were grilled, not steamed, and the toppings were limited to yellow mustard, green relish, and onions. I don't remember a chili at all...
My great-grandmother knew Howard Johnson when he opened his ice cream shop in Wollaston, MA:

"Eager to ensure that his drugstore would remain successful, Johnson decided to come up with a new ice cream recipe. Some sources say the new recipe was based on his mother's homemade ice creams and desserts, while others say that the new recipe was from a local German immigrant, who either sold or gave Johnson the new ice cream recipe. Regardless, the new recipe made the ice cream more flavorful due to an increased content of butterfat. Eventually Johnson came up with 28 flavors of ice cream. Johnson is quoted as saying, "I thought I had every flavor in the world. The 28 flavors (of ice cream) became my trademark."

I guess I should contribute to Wikipedia; my great-grandmother was the German immigrant. The family story was that she gave him the recipe for her peach ice cream, and he took it from there. (The secret to the "peachiness" was grinding up the pits into dust and blending it in...)

Great story,Chauly...great HoJo history....thanks!

I cooked for HoJo's--back before they went nuts and went to FROZEN factory food--and yes the dogs were good!--actually cooked in real butter---on the grill and served on butter grilled split top buns on cardboard sleeves! Those sleeves were commen in New England when i was a kid in the 50,s.

i loved the fried clams. during my college years a HoJo was about 10 mins away and nothing was better than to have the Firday All YOu Can Eat Clam special. I used to devour 2-3 large portions before running out of steam. I never tried their dogs... BKK

They called their hotdogs "frankforts"

Used to go up "route 2" to visit my aunt in Littleton, and my father would always stop at the Hojo's near the Concord rotary. My mother used to tell me "you can go in with him", and I understood why. He would go to the counter and order two hot dogs to go with everything. Then, he would get them, grilled, and would open the wax paper, with nothing on it!. He then would go to the counter again and start arguing, the waitress would say, "you need to put the fixins on over there, the packets" Again he would pitch a fit!...But everytime, same thing, dogs at HoJo's, and I had to go in!...

That's why I never use packets at our stand!!!

If I had a time machine, one of the places I'd visit would be a HoJo's some forty or so years ago. When my family traveled up and down the East Coast visiting relatives back in the sixties, we always stopped for lunch at HoJo's, and I usually had a hot dog. I wish I could have just one more.

I figure Howard Johnson's started down the road to Hell when people began calling it HoJo's.

I noticed the mention of "yellow" mustard on the hot dogs. I can agree that the green relish and onions where available toppings.

My credentials for the following a varied. In the early 1950's I would ride my bike to the Howard Johnsons on the old route 3 in Pembroke, MA for ice creme, fried clams, or a hot dog ... often.

My dad owned a restaurant next to the Suffolk Downs race track in Boston for many years ( 1930's ) and bought his ice creme from Howard D. Johnson in Quincy long before the restaurants became main stream. He was friends with Howard over the years ( he became a utility executive )and was very familiar with the ice creme manufacturing facillity and commissary in Brockton, MA.

All of this is leading up to the fact that the mustard served well into the 60's was a "brown" mustard that was "unique" to HJ.

I have yet to find any receipe or off the shelf "brand" that closely matches. I have come close myself with my own version having had some clues from the past, however it's a "secret" receipe!

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Hoffman

I figure Howard Johnson's started down the road to Hell when people began calling it HoJo's.

Close. I lay the blame on HoJo Cola.

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Hoffman

I figure Howard Johnson's started down the road to Hell when people began calling it HoJo's.

I would say it all started when they ordered the first "Litton Ovens" and started sending us boxes of frozen entrees from the factory instead of cooking. Cooks should run write recipes not corporations!!!

Holly,
I agree. HoJo Cola was the symbol of the down-fall of the Roadside era HoJo. The joke at the time (for the employee's) was that it was named "HoJo Cola" because the management couldn't agree on a spelling for "Yuck-Bleech!"

As for the Frankfurts, I worked the grill many times in the early 60's. The Weinies were kept in a metal pan on a warming grill-corner. They sat in melted butter in that pan. It had a roller at one end so that we could use tongs to move a Frankfurt from the pan to the hotter part of the grill, then run the sides of the Bun over the roller to get some melted butter on each side, then toss it on the grill beside the Weinie! That Toasted Bun really make the Frankfurt a good 'Hot Dog' The Weinie itself wasn't anything special in my book.

Two Grilled Franks,a slice of the canned Brown bread (buttered & toasted) and one of the one-cup Stoneware Bean Pots full of HoJo's brand of Baked Beans was the typical Saturday Nite Supper for many of the customers at our Store on Rt-95 north of Boston (Rowley,MA)

quote:

Originally posted by tiki

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Hoffman

I figure Howard Johnson's started down the road to Hell when people began calling it HoJo's.

I would say it all started when they ordered the first "Litton Ovens" and started sending us boxes of frozen entrees from the factory instead of cooking. Cooks should run write recipes not corporations!!!

I didn't know they did that.

I worked at Howard Johnsons while in college 1963-66. Entrees were done in a central commissary and shipping out in 'baggies' to the restaurants. Meat dishes like the Short-Ribs and Smothered Pork Chops were packaged in foil heating pans usually 4 or 6 servings in a pan, Frozen hard with the gravy and onions etc in the pan. In the Pork Chop example we would scoop out a thawed and heated Pork Chop from the pan, scoop some dressing/stuffing put it on the Chop then 'smother' the whole thing with the gravy from the Chop Pan.

Cassarole dishes were kept frozen in their bags..tossed into boiling water to thaw and heat. Pour the bag contents over the rice, noodles or whatever potatoes was called for and it was done. Typical menu items that used this technique were the Beef Burgundy, Shrimp Creole, and Lamb & Beef Strogenof (sp?).

With the Fried Seafood, The Clam strips came raw in paper containers much the same as the old half-gallon Milk Cartons. Pull back the corner to form a pour-spout. They were breaded/battered just before frying...as were the Scallops and Flounder Fillet. (I loved Fish Fry Night, AYCE Flounder, Fries, and Slaw for $.99 (later it was $1.35) Onion Rings were cut in the store and battered to order! Only the Scallops and Onion Rings were double breaded.

The one steak on the menu a "Char-Broiled Rib Steak" (bone in). It Was pre-grilled at the commissary to 'Rare' then frozen. We thawed and completed the broiling to requested doneness at the time of ordering. ($2.45 in 1963)

The Most complex order for the short-order guy was the Club Sandwich with Onion Rings. The Rings had to be double battered getting the cook real messy and requiring more than just a rinse of hands to be 'clean' enough to handle the other food. if the bacon for the sandwich was done in advance it got easier, but often late in the afternoon, the 'pre-done' bacon had been used up so we had to do it from raw on the grill. Deep frying Bacon was not permitted.

Wow!!!!!!

Another HJ dish I liked (for myself) was the Welsh Rarebit-- two slices of toast, quartered, two or more slices of Tomato with the canned W.R. Cheese Sauce poured (hot) over it in a cassarole dish. I would break up several slices of crisp bacon into the Cheese Sauce and add some chopped Scallions if we had any. Some of the help did a poached egg or two on top of all that. Not a common order from the front, but the employees liked it.

BTW The Seafood was all frozen from the comissary. The clam strips in their 'milk containers' were packed 6 to a case and frozen solid. We had to thaw them before breading. 4oz of strips for a Clam dinner, 3oz for a side/small order and 2 oz for the buttered and toasted Clam Roll. The Lobster Roll was served two ways.. Hot in Butter in the roll and Cold in Mayo with celery, again in a toasted roll.

I wish I could go back in time and try some of these dishes you talk about...as a kid a visit to H.J. was a hot dog in that sleeve and fries...that's all I cared about!!

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

quote:

Originally posted by tiki

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Hoffman

I figure Howard Johnson's started down the road to Hell when people began calling it HoJo's.

I would say it all started when they ordered the first "Litton Ovens" and started sending us boxes of frozen entrees from the factory instead of cooking. Cooks should run write recipes not corporations!!!

I didn't know they did that.

Yep--i was working for them in Bloomington Ind.when the 'family owned business" went corporate---suddenly there appeared these new fangled stainless steel boxes that you plugged in---then came the shipments of frozen everythings and the "Cookbook" that came with them said things like-"inset in Litton oven--close door--set for 8 mins--rotate 180 degrees---'''blah blah blah---shortly after that they started to push me into going to thier new management school in Georgia where i would become an assistant manager that they could send anywhere they wanted to work for 20 hrs more and $30 LESS PER WEEK THAN I MADE AS THIER AM COOK--I WOULDN'T DO IT---they pressured me for 2 weeks until i finally said this is crap--i quit --and walked out at 8;30 am---went across the street to the Wagon Wheel Cafe and ordered breakfast---they asked what i was doing here and not working---i told them and the manager asked me if i wanted to work there---i said yes--started the nest am--that next week MOST of my regulars followed.