I expected the archtype of the Coney Islands I ate at Keith's Drive-in on Seawall Boulevard in Galveston, Texas, when I was a kid. I had my mouth set for a hot dog with mustard, relish and onions, covered with chili and topped by a thick layer of melted American cheese. Instead, I got a chili dog with processed cheese squirted on the top.
Here's how you make the real thing.
Use whatever kind of buns, hot dogs and chili you like best. (My wife has even used smart dogs and vegetarian chili on whole wheat buns, but I don't vouch for that.) What I do vouch for is all beef hot dogs, regular hot dog buns, American cheese and this fast chili recipe.
Chili
2 Tbsp Peanut Oil
2-3 cloves of garlic
1 small onion
1 pound of ground beef
3 0z bottle of Gephardt's chili powder
Salt and pepper
2 8 oz cans of Hunts tomato sauce
Mince the garlic and chop the onion
Heat the oil in a thick-bottomed pot and saute the garlic and onion
Add the ground beef and brown it
Add salt and pepper and 1/2 to 3/4 of the bottle of chili powder (If you need to add more chili powder later, take some of the chili from the pot, mix in the chili powder, then dump the mix back in. Don't just shake dry chili powder into the chili.)
Add the tomato sauce and 2 cans of water
Cook at a low boil for 30 minutes or more.
Coney Islands
Preheat the oven to between 250 and 325 degrees.
Heat the chili.
Put some hot dog buns in a baking dish.
Heat the hot dogs in boiling water for a couple of minutes then stick them in the buns. (If you have young kids, slice the hot dogs about 3/4 of the way through lengthwise.)
Add mustard, relish, onions and chili in that order. (My daughter adds ketchup, too, but I don't vouch for that, either. You do what you want.) At this point you have a pretty good chili dog.
Cover each chili dog with a couple of strips of American cheese. Absolutely no substitutions. I use 1 slice, broken in half, for each Coney Island. Sometimes I use 2 slices, but I think that makes the cheese too thick.
Bake in the middle of the oven until the cheese is completely melted and the buns are toasty.
I like to cut my Coney Islands in half before I eat them.
What?
Beer is good with Coney Islands, but, for my money, milk is actually better.
