Charleston HDJ Review - Tricky Fish, redux

There's an old saying that goes "fool me once shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."

Shame on me, then.

When I first reviewed Tricky Fish a year and a half ago, they had just opened and I didn't even give the hot dog a Weenie Rank because it was so non-WVHD-like. I've been back on numerous occasions, but I opted for one of their non-hot dog items, even though I did notice that they had changed their hot dog and the new version sounded much more WVHD like. On several of these trips I considered giving the new offering an honest review, but I was little nervous about it.

Nervous, you see, because shortly after I posted my review, another blog reviewed the place and the blog comments turned into a virtual battlefield complete with allegations of venomous attacks on a young artist and vicious counter attacks by the parents of said artist. I decided to steer clear of the row, less I become collateral damage in this war of words.

But I figured after a year-and-a-half the water was safe enough to go back into, especially since that other blog has seemingly decided to review only chains and faraway restaurants. [poke] [poke]

Tricky Fish has kind of recreated itself in the past year, adding a large front deck and the words "Urban Beach" to their name. The recreated hot dog also has a new name: "Nathans Famous." Yes, that's what they call it on the menu. I found this interesting; that an establishment would and could name a dish the name of another restaurant. Interesting, but understandable; I mean Nathans Famous weenies are pretty awesome and why not recreate yourself in the image of something awesome?

The first bad thing about ordering this or any of the other "hot dogs" on their menu (they have a veggie dog and an Italian Sausage dog) is that you have to sift through a large number of available toppings to get the basic WVHD toppings. Thankfully chili, slaw, mustard and onions are among the items on this list.

The second bad thing about ordering this hot dog is that it comes with a knife and fork. Really, people, how many times do we have to go over this? The National Hot Dog and Sausage Council and tasteful people everywhere know that you don't use utensils to eat a hot dog! Click here to watch the NHDSC Hot Dog Etiquette video.

The third bad thing about this hot dog is that the toppings are so overwhelmingly applied that one has no choice but to eat it with the knife and fork. Look at the photo: You can barely see the bun for the scads of chili and slaw poured over the poor little thing. There was absolutely no way to pick it up without losing half of the toppings.

Not that losing the toppings would have been such a bad thing: The taste of the chili was OK - fairly spicy and very meaty, but it really didn't taste like something that should be on a hot dog. The slaw was so bland that if it had been missing it would not have affected the taste one iota.

It's a shame to waste a perfectly good Nathans Famous weenie like this.

This time they do get a score: 1.5 Weenies.

I won't be fooled again.