Last weekend, I treated myself to a new spot I’ve been eyeing in the Tacoma blog scene. Friday night I had a Murray Morgan Bridge Brat with cream cheese from the Red Hot. It was really good, but I would order at least 2 at a time in the future. I would also know how to conduct myself a little better in the environment they’ve created. We walked in and weren’t sure what to do with ourselves. There was no menu on the wall, no “order here” or “order at the bar” signs anywhere (perhaps they are still being made?) so we sat down at a table. Of course, we came to find out that there is no table service, and that we were supposed to get our own menus and order at the counter. This should be streamlined ASAP, if it hasn’t been already.
Tacoma has needed another non-downtown hot dog joint forever, and I even thought about opening a drive-thru wiener stand (I planned on calling it Shwank’s) a couple years back. If you are going to open a restaurant, it doesn’t get much easier than hot dogs as far as storage, life span, cost, keeping them warm, etc. I sincerely hope this place can make its mark and stick around. My first impression was that of a bar and not of a restaurant… hopefully they will make it go on the drinks because it didn’t seem like the kind of place that would enjoy rapid hot dog take-away.
Ben Matlock and I are more than willing to park, walk in, and wait for a hot dog or two to take home. Unfortunately, neither Ben nor myself go out drinking very often..Hopefully for The Red Hot’s sake, there are a lot of people in Tacoma who will do both quite often.