Thursday, October 19, 2006

Quick Hot Dog Review - Mollohan's Family Restaurant


Now I bet you saw the title of this post and thought this was going to be a brief little post. No, it is a rather long post about a hot dog joint in the town of Quick, West Virginia.

Quick is just a hoot and a holler from Pinch. Pinch is between Miliken and Elkview. So even if you're not from around here you can see that getting to Quick is, well, not quick. It's not on the way to anywhere. If you lived in Quick and someone told you they just dropped by because they were in the neighborhood, they would be lying.

And that is apparently the reason that Dorsey Mollohan decided to open up a restaurant in the old Quick post office building. Before Mollohan's Family Restaurant the nearest sit down restaurant was 13 miles away. Open seven days a week, they seem to sincerely want to serve this little community. The interior walls of the restaurant serves as a bulletin board with flyers pinned up for every flea market and community gathering around.

The restaurant has been open since last December and it serves breakfast, lunch and dinner. The breakfast menu has all the basics and lunch is the usual family restaurant fare. They have a daily special dinner (I assume you can get it for lunch too) like chicken & dumplings or roast beef and gravy. Pizza and calzones take up the back page of the menu. They also had an absolutely scrumptious assortment of desserts listed on the menu board. All home made, I was assured by the very sweet waitress.

But I didn't drive all this way for desserts or dinner specials, did I? No, I didn't (and thanks for asking).

Hot dogs are $1.10 each and at that price I figured I'd have two. Everything, I was told, included chili, slaw, mustard, ketchup and onions. I asked the waitress to leave off the ketchup. I nearly gave her a lecture about the impropriety of ketchup on hot dogs but I decided against it.

While I waited on my order I walked around and marveled at the quaint decor and the cleanliness of the place. I think you really could eat off the floors. I read all the flyers hanging around that told about community events. I looked at the framed newspaper articles about the restaurant that were hanging on the walls. I read the entire menu cover to cover. I picked up a Gazette someone had left behind and read it - all of it. And still I waited. I walked over to the wall that held the menu board and saw this sign posted there:


Oh, that explains it.

Two hotdogs. Thirty-two minutes. Patience redefined.


But they did finally arrive. And they were almost worth the wait.

My Huntington operative, Chris James, told me that the highest praise he could give a hot dog would be to say it tasted like someone's mom made it. He would love this hot dog. It is made with care and is topped with chili that tastes like grandma just whipped it up. Meaty and delicious, but not a bit spicy. The slaw was obviously freshly made and was finely chopped and very creamy. A little sweeter would have been nice, but most HDJs could learn from Mollohan's slaw chef. Both toppings were served in huge amounts - so much that one dog would have filled me up nicely. They were beautiful to look at and presented on a quaint Currier and Ives-esque platter. Nice touch for a down home place. The bun was oven warmed and the weenie was just excellent. All-beef, I was told.

If not for the long wait I would give these dogs a four-and-a-half weenie rating, but knock off a half point for the delay. If I wanted a nice relaxing family and friends meal then the wait would be a plus, but hot dogs are a grab and go food and there's really no fun in waiting that long for them. I fully intend to go back sometime for one of their dinner specials and then I will make no bones about the laid back pace. And you might say that I shouldn't complain because I was warned, but the warning wasn't posted in a spot where you would see it easily. Maybe it should be printed on the menu.

Mollohan's is open 11AM - 8PM Monday thru Friday, 10AM - 8PM Saturday and 10AM-6PM Sunday. It is located right on Pinch-Quick Road just as you come in to Quick.

1 comment:

John Mollohan said...

If its made by a Mollohan,It has to be good!!!!!
I otta know,cause I am a Mollohan
Good Luck!!!!