Fellow Seattle blogger, the Savvy Savorer, posted a nice little piece on Voodoo Doughnuts. I'm sad I missed them the last time I was in Portland. Looks tasty and sounds even better. All for the low low price of $1.30. Head on over and check it out.How I Ate The Voodoo Doll
I just discovered cheapassfood.com. I have to admit I'm jealous. Its everything this blog will never be. Not to mention the primary subject is NYC. Check it out. These folks are advancing the cheap food mission with a passion. I've also put a link on the right.
cheap ass food
With over a dozen hot dog establishments all vying for top position as the greatest hot dog its hard to go wrong when looking for an authentic Chicago style dog. Its pretty easy to find Chicago style dog recommendations in the blogosphere. Hundreds of opinions are out there. The Chicago Traveler has done a couple recent pieces on Hot Doug's and Portillo's, both pillars in hot dog world, as one example.
I was recently in Chicago for a meeting and trapped downtown, without a car, and in need of a a cheap hot dog. Unlike most of the better hot dog joints around town, Portillo's has a branch downtown easily accessible without car or train.
The interior of the shop (above) is pretty crappy. It sort of has that food court mall feel but without the benefit of a mall. There are a bunch of community tables scattered around two food court-esque store fronts - one for dogs/meats one for pasta. What? Pasta? You do get the feel that the place is touristed out a bit. What none of the online reviews tells you is that the restaurants are themed. The particular branch I went to was a silly "30s, 40s gangster theme." Which means there is all kinds of crap plastered (old cars, a barbershop?) on the walls and scattered about the restaurant. Whatever. I was there for the dogs.
I ended up ordering the beef dog with fries and a diet coke.
What makes a Chicago dog a Chicago dog is primarily the way that it is served. The hot dog is placed in a poppy seed bun, topped with mustard, onion, relish (usually a fluorescent green concoction), a dill pickle, tomato slices, sport peppers (like mini-jalapenos), and celery salt. Supposedly its taboo to put catchup on a true Chicago dog so I stayed away from that. 
By a stroke of luck I was given an extra order of fries. It might not be the healthiest thing (according to Chicago Moms blog), but quite honestly, the dog rivaled any hot dog or other cheap food I've ever had. Even better, the bill was about $9
Having lived in Seattle for nearly eight years I've struggled to find a decent cheap sandwich. The recent opening of Goldberg's Deli in Factorial mall has certainly improved the quality of sandwiches available to those in the Puget sound area. Finally there was an answer for everyone who thought the Boarshead corned beef served up at the Other Coast "is the best in town." While Goldberg's has taken the east coast deli title as one of the best sandwiches around it is anything but cheap. Fortunately a relatively new restaurant, The Baguette Box, provides everything I need in a sandwich - fantastic quality and cheap price.
Although the Baguette Box has not been open for too long, they already have have two locations: Capitol Hill and another in Fremont. The restaurant is the "little brother" of the restaurant Monsoon which is, in my opinion, one of the best under-the-radar restaurants in Seattle. As it turns out, this little brother takes its inspiration from big-sister's specialty - Vietnamese Pacific Northwest fusion.
Sandwiches served at Baguette Box are all variations of the traditional Vietnamese Bánh mì sandwich which typically include spiced meat or tofu, a crunchy vegetable (carrots, radish), jalapenos, and cilantro all served in a baguette. While the options for variation are virtually infinite, Baguette Box has crafted a dozen or so fantastic combinations. Crispy drunken chicken , braised pork shoulder with red wine, salumi cured meat (thats what I said, SALUMI!), grilled lemon grass skirt steat, grilled yellow squash and eggplant, and of course tofu. Price varies from $4.75 (tofu) to $7.50 (lamb, salumi) for a generous sandwich. Bánh mì lovers will recognize that this is dramatically higher than the typical Bánh mì found in the ID ($2), but the attention and work put into these sandwiches make the price justified.
A number of salads and french fries as well as truffle fries (fries drizzled with truffle oil) provide the sides.
My first experience was the braised pork in red wine sauce. Delicious. The bread is beautifully baked, crispy with a soft center. The meat was tender and savory. The truffle fries were a highlight offering a novel complex earthy flavor to what was a pretty good fry on its own. Total price for sandwich and fries - $11.05.
I was recently in Toronto for Critical Care Canada Forum. Tim and I were staying in Summerhill near the LCBO. While most of our time was spent at the conference a few hours were spent at Wylie's neighborhood pub. We inquired about good cheap food in Toronto having never visited with a particular interest in finding good fish and chips. We were pointed to Chippy's.
Chippy's is a tiny fish and chips shop in West Queen Street West (there is one on Bloor too), one of the hipper neighborhoods in Toronto. After hitching a cab from the St. Lawrence market, where we downed a quick Peameal bacon sandwich (which would be the subject of another post, but I just don't have enough pictures), we entered Chippy's. The first thing we liked about the place was the wallet friendly menu. Almost all of the fish meals (including fries) were less than $10. Halibut was the exception ringing in at $10.99 for fish and chip combo. Diners have their choice of several varieties of fish including haddock, salmon, cod, halibut, and other seafoods like prawns and scallops. There is even chowder for those interested. We opted for an order of the Halibut (just had to see if the extra $$ was worth it) and the classic cod - the true fish and chips fish. 
Within about 5 min our both fish and chips were plucked from the fryer and piled high in a cardboard paper box. The fish was breaded and golden brown. The breading was light, crispy, and surprisingly devoid of palpable grease. The two bottles of Guinness in every batch of fish batter ensures just the right taste when fried. The fish was flaky, fleshy and cooked to perfection. Delicious. The cod versus halibut difference was minimal. Both were fantastic. As for the condiments...ample vinegar is stocked around the small shop. I skipped the tartar sauce. I cannot understand why people would water down goodness of unadulterated fried fish with tartar sauce.
As for the fries, fantastic. Crisp, soft-centered, minimal soggy stragglers...is there Guinness in the chips too? Total cost for the three-person second lunch? Just under $19 Canadian. Which these days is a bit pricier than one might expect. Maybe $21 US.
"Cheaper Than Food" is the motto for Krazy Jim's Blimpy Burgers in Ann Arbor, MI - a fitting establishment to name a blog after. Blimpy Burgers has been flipping quads and quints + since 1953 and barely slowed in 2001 when 1/2 the kitchen burned down (the restaurant re-opened in a matter of months after a new grill was purchased). There are numerous other posts around the net about the greasy goodness Blimpy Burgers serves up, most of them full accolades for the food and annoyance at the standard anger filled service (there are a number of comparisons of Blimpy's being the soup nazi equivalent of a burger joint). One of my favorites is that of Monster Munching who nicely describes his experience with Blimpy's. I've happily lifted pictures posted on his blog here.
"If its not grilled its fried" could be another motto of Blimpy's. This is easy to determine when confronted with the menu. Blimpy's claims that "...no two Blimpy Burgers that are the same - ever." Based on estimates that there are more than 1,245,760 possible Blimpy's burger combinations I'd have to agree. Burgers are ordered by the patty (10 to a pound) + grilled toppings + cold toppings. Vegetarians are luck to have a couple of options. There is a deep fried veggie burger on the menu and a sides include fried vegetables of all sorts, mushrooms, potatoes, onions, broccoli, and so on.
The kitchen staff are intentionally obnoxious, but who cares. Nobody goes to a burger joint for the pleasant service. Burgers are made with love and served quickly and usually dripping in grease. Patties are cooked thin, sometimes crispy, and always stacked high on your choice of over a half-dozen bread selections. Toppings vary from the usual standards such as lettuce, tomatoes, grilled mushrooms and onions, to more exotic ones like salami and egg.
The burger and condiments add a wonderful texture to the tasty grease. What more could you want for $4.00 burger.
More info on Blimpy's:
Pictures
Michigan Daily Articles: 1 million ways to dress your burger at Blimpy's. A fantastic article written by friend Patricia Duque. Best Burgers: Blimpy Burgers
A couple of my friends/work colleagues recently moved to Toronto. They left Seattle for the prosperous land of Canada for better jobs and a more cosmopolitan way of life. Both being foodies they quickly set their sights on ferreting out the better places to eat in the city and began a blog cataloging their introduction to food in Toronto. (For those interested in their thoughts, a link to the blog is listed at the right.)
The blog got me thinking about the best meals I've eaten over the last 10 years or so. At the end of the exercise I had a list memorable places all of which most people would hardly classify as "restaurants." But they were all places run by hard working people who were as committed as to providing a memorable eating experience as any critically acclaimed restaurant.
Cheapness is in the eye of the beholder but in my mind escaping from dinner for less than $10 a person is pretty damn good. What follows are memorable places that in my opinion epitomize the provision of great cheap food.
