What I Ate: September 21, 2009 (Frank - Hot Dogs Cold Beer)

Dinner: Tina and I headed over to Frank (407 Colorado St, Austin, TX‎ - (512) 494-6894‎) for dinner. We had gone in expecting to order from the Austin Restaurant Week menu but realized that given the regular prices of some of the items it wasn't always a good deal to order from the ARW menu unless we got certain items that we weren't sure we wanted. So, we ordered a la carte (skipping the deserts and trying a couple sides instead).

Canadian Waffle Poutine Fries with brown gravy and cheese curds Their take on the Quebecois gravy smothered French fries and cheese curds was pretty tasty. I felt the waffle fries were a little undercooked rendering them softer than they would have been (even drenched in the gravy). Some bites were a bit overly salty with both the salted cheese curds and the brown gravy, but overall it's a pretty tasty way to eat fries.

Jackalope Antelope and Rabbit sausage, huckleberry compote, sriracha aioli, smoked cheddar This sausage was gamey in a very appealing way. I kept craving the flavor after I finished the sausage and if I wasn't full, I would have ordered another one. The fruity tartness of the compote matched the strong flavor of the sausage and the sriracha provided a mild (almost hidden) burn. I want another one right now.

Chicago Dog Poppy seed bun, Vienna Beef, pickle, tomato, onion, day-glo relish, sport peppers, celery salt, mustard It's been a while since I've had a Chicago-style Hot Dog. In fact, since Chi-Dog closed in Santa Clara, I wasn't able to get my hands on a Chicago-style dog on any sort of regular basis. The last time I had one was while making a mad dash through the O'Hare Airport during a brief stop (I had to make a mad dash because I didn't need to transfer planes and was supposed to stay on the plane - however, I had to find a hot dog vendor to fulfill a year-long craving). It's been at least four or five years since then that I had a Chicago-style hot dog. Eating this Chicago Dog was somehow unsatisfying. Perhaps it was because I had the Jackalope just before and the flavors are so incredibly different. Intellectually, I can find no fault in the construction of Frank's Chicago Dog - all the ingredients are correct and so is the preparation. I'll have to give it another try in the future, but somehow tonight it didn't touch that special part of my brain that loves the Chicago-style hot dog.

Corn cup South of the border style grilled corn served off the cob with chili, lime, cilantro and cheese The corn was delicious with a sharp lime flavor at the start and crispy, juicy corn kernels (not overcooked by one bit). The only thing that could have improved it was sweeter corn (not that the corn wasn't sweet, but it could have been sweeter).

Broccoli salad Toasted almonds, bacon, red onion, dressing I had put my camera away by the time we added the broccoli salad to our order and didn't bother pulling it out again. The salad was very good in that it didn't try to mask the flavor of the broccoli. A lot of time broccoli salad is super-sweet and broccoli swims in dressing and the bacon is the real star. This isn't one of those - the broccoli is the main event and the bacon, onion, almonds, and dressing give it character.

We really liked Frank - it's a nice casual place to enjoy artisan sausages and non-HFCS soda (or beer if you are so inclined). We're definitely going to go back and try some of their other sausages (especially the Notorious P.I.G. - pork, bacon, jalapeno and sage sausage - or the Chicken Marsala - chicken pancetta portobello mushroom marsala wine sausage).

Lunch: Tina and I ate pig's feet that her mom had cooked in soy sauce and spices until falling apart. Tina wilted some arugula with shallots and served it all with rice.