Pinks in Hollywood: What Rhymes With Pinks?

PINKS HOT DOGS
709 N La Brea Bl, Hollywood
323.931.4223
Click for a Map to Pink's

PARTICULARS:
Standard Hot Dog, 10 inch Stretch Dog,
Mild or Spicy Polish Sausage, Turkey Dog,
VEGGIE DOG FER CRYIN' OUT LOUD!
Red Onions, Chili, Sour Cream, American,
Nacho and Swiss Cheese, Sauerkraut, Cole Slaw,
Bacon, Pastrami, Jalapeno Peppers, Guacamole
Various Celebrity Dog Combos of Dubious
Authenticity, Hamburgers, Turkey Burger,
Fries, Onion Rings, Chips, Coconut and
Marble Cake
Health Department Rating: No Sign Visible

DISTINCTIONS:
Open all night

We've been sitting on this review for over a week, because we know what we have to say is going to be about as popular as announcing there's no Santa Claus at a Kindergarten Christmas party. But in the name of all things honest and virtuous, we have decided to take a stand and defend the honor of the world's greatest foodstuff, the hot dog. OK. Here goes...

Steve Doggie-Dogg and Jon the Food Slob attended a performance of Chicago Mike's Band at Goldfingers in Hollywood. After the show, Mike asked if we were hungry for a dog. Of course we were! We've received a mailbag full of requests to review the landmark Hollywood doggery, Pinks. Since it was just a hop, skip and a jump away from Goldfingers, we decided to give it a try. None of us had been to Pinks in a dog's life, so we were fresh faced and primed for some mighty fine eatin'. Would it rate a thumbs up or a thumbs down? We were ready to find out.



When we arrived, the line wasn't too bad. Usually at this time of night, folks are lined up like cattle on the sidewalk. As we waited to put in our orders, we looked over the list of celebrity dog combos on the menu... the Huell Howser Dog is two hot dogs in a single bun smothered with chili. Martha Stewart's Dog is a 10 inch Stretch Dog with mustard, relish, onions, tomatoes, sauerkraut, bacon and sour cream. Rosie O'Donnell supposedly favors a Stretch with mustard, onions, chili and kraut. The Harry Potter Dog consists of a Polish with grilled onions and mushrooms, bacon, nacho cheese and jalapenos. And the Lord of the Rings Dog features a 10 inch Stretch with "Yummy" (sic) BBQ sauce topped with onion rings... Chicago Mike couldn't figure out who the hell these combos were targeted at... He certainly had no interest himself in eating Huell's two wieners in the same bed, much less Martha's or Rosie's gloppy sounding messes!

Steve Doggie-Dogg threw up his hands and decided to just stick with his regular... Three Standard Dogs with Brown Mustard, Onions, Cheese and Tomato along with a Diet Coke. The nice Hispanic lady behind the counter replied, "No got brown mustard." "NO BROWN MUSTARD?! What kind of place is this?!" Steve exclaimed. "No got." the Hispanic lady repeated, nonplussed. Steve broke down and reluctantly authorized her to apply plain yellow to his dogs. "Dats tree New Yorks with yellow mustard, extra tomato and cheese and a Diet Coke, right?" "Huh? I want three dogs with mustard, onions, tomatoes and..." "Si, Si... I got it..." Steve headed for the waiting area scratching his head wondering what his order would end up looking like in English. Next up to bat was Chicago Mike. He ordered the geographical favorites... a New York and a Chicago Dog with a bag of chips and a Root Beer. Jon the Food Slob, ever the daring soul, ordered a Huell Howser duo dog smothered in brown and a Diet Coke.



Steve Doggie-Dogg was dismayed to find nothing but cheap plastic lawn chairs in the eating area. "How the hell am I gonna park my corpulent ass in one of those rickety things?" he griped. But there was no proper chair in sight. Grumbling, he made do, sitting on top of a bush growing out of one of the planters ringing the patio area. Jon the Food Slob commented on how the patio had all the charm and atmosphere of eating in a downtown parking lot. Steve sarcastically pointed beneath his butt. "I'm sitting on the landscaping." Chicago Mike sat quietly and skeptically eyed the place with its bizarre mix of Hollywood fringies and disreputable teenage kids.

After a couple of minutes, we went to the pickup window and got our meal. Here's what it looked like...



Almost immediately, we noticed something was VERY wrong here... Steve's dogs looked nothing like what he ordered, and Mike's Chicago Dog arrived as a Polish Sausage. Mike bit into his New York Dog at the same instant Steve was trying one of his regulars. They did simultaneous spit takes and started frantically scraping the mess off the top of the dogs. Apparently Pinks' idea of a New York Dog is a disgusting amalgam of ketchup and yesterday's sauteed onions. The onion goop tasted sour and spoiled. It completely ruined the dogs it blanketed.



Mike retreated to his Chicago Dog, but Steve was forced to scrape and wring out his dogs to try to salvage them. But even after they were purged of the New York slime, the dog meat proved to be nasty tasting, with a thick rubbery skin. When you bite into Pinks' Standard Dog, the insides slide out between your teeth, leaving a sinewy foreskin behind. Not exactly ideal... Mike's Polish Dog was a bit better. The skin snapped sharp and the spice was perfect, but on closer inspection the dog meat proved to consist of a larger than average percentage of arteries and tendons. But it was dark on the patio... there may have been worse things in it that we couldn't see. Most disgusting of all was the horrendous Huell Howser monstrosity. It was the ugliest mess of dog glop we have ever witnessed. It seemed to pulse and throb, and everywhere it went, it left a snail trail of orange grease behind. Plucky Jon the Food Slob smiled and cut into it, but he wasn't smiling too long.


Huell Howser really eats THIS?!

The chili tasted like a combination of flour, tobasco, cigarette butts and last week's scrapings off the grill. If you put a bowl of it in the oven, it would probably bake up into some kind of ungodly mutant made of meat and bread. It sure as hell didn't qualify as chili the way any of us define it! Although Jon tried to keep a chipper face on the proceedings, it was clear he was struggling. He left a sizable chunk of his Huell Dog on the plate uneaten. We put our heads together and tried to think of a fair Dog Rating to fit this unique experience. Mike and Steve gave it "One Dog"... basically scoring it as being tubular and made of something that looks like meat. Jon the Food Slob was a bit more generous, giving it a "Two Dogs" because Pinks is open all night. It was a half-hearted attempt at seeing the bright side of a disastrous affair. We generously averaged the rating up into a "One And A Half Dog".



As we walked to our cars, Steve Doggie-Dogg worried about posting an honest and straightforward review of such a sacred cow as Pinks. "We'll be tarred and feathered!" he fretted. Mike shook his head and said, "Even covered in tar and feathers, we'd look better than that Huell Howser Dog." Jon the Food Slob was optimistic. "Maybe we hit it on a bad night... we could try again sometime." Steve and Mike's response to Jon's suggestion was unprintable.

UPDATE: June 28th, 2004

A bit of controversy erupted over our review of Pinks on the Los Angeles Chowhound Message Board. Chowhound Spike posted this comment about our review. Apparently, Pink's does have its supporters. Steve Doggie-Dogg's impassioned defense of our review responds to Spike's complaint.