Charleston Area Hot Dog Joint - The Movie House Cafe

Located about a mile up Campbell's Creek, this little establishment feeds the body and the mind that is hungry for entertainment. Here, you can sit down to nice little informal family dinner and then rent and take home the latest horror flick on DVD. The decor of the little place is "Coca Cola Americana" with Coke themed everything, save the movie posters hanging on the walls. A great deal of care has been taken to make the place visually interesting on the inside, including a model train that circles the room on a track atop the walls. It is clean, neat and comfortable. The exterior, though, is plain and ordinary.


I stopped in for a hot dog on a recent afternoon and the place was completely empty, but the person behind the counter said he usually has a good lunch crowd. Since it was such a nice fall day I ordered my one hot dog with everything (which means chili, slaw, mustard and onions) to go and went to Daniel Boone Park to feast al fresco. I peaked into the bag as I left the restaurant and was pleased to see that the dog was wrapped in wax paper, so I knew that by the time I made the five-minute trip to the park the dog would be nicely steamed.

When I got to the park and opened the wrapper, the first thing I noticed was the color of the slaw. Most slaw in these parts is basically white, but this was an interesting green color. I couldn't tell what it was that gave it its color, but the slaw was finely chopped and looked great. It tasted great too; sweet and quite tasty. The chili was also pretty good; meaty and served liberally but not much spice at all. With the heavy servings of toppings the hot dog had great weight to it and was very satisfying for a 99 cent dog. As I expected the bun had acheived a near perfect texture on the trip.

Pretty darn good hot dog, overall. It could definitely benefit from a spicier chili, but that's about the only knock I can give it.

To get to there head east on Route 60 out of Charleston and turn left on Campbell's Creek Drive (this is the first traffic light on 60). The Movie House Cafe is about a mile ahead on your left.