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For 45 years, Bob Parsons went to work every day in a suit. Now, the former manager of Jake's Famous Crawfish, the Benson Hotel and the University Club of Portland wears a neon polo shirt with his first name embroidered on the breast, and an apron that reads "Top Dog."
This year, with a former Jake's customer named Spike Friedman, Parsons started up Spike's Hot Dogs just a few blocks from Jake's in a walk-up space next to Target. It is guaranteed to be Portland's first dedicated hot dog restaurant to feature an eight-deep mustard buffet, three kinds of regional relish and a dog-and-tot hash called a Doggie Bowl ($7.25, $5 after 4 pm).
Four years ago, when Friedman first approached Parsons about opening a hot dog emporium, Parsons had only one other entrepreneurial restaurant endeavor in his career. In the '80s, he opened a short-lived 1930s-style big band nightclub called Father's American Broiler & Nightclub.
Before opening Spike's, Parsons and Friedman researched hot dog feasibility for three years, and decided the country was on the verge of a wiener explosion. They weren't entirely wrong: Burger King launched its hot dog last February, McDonald's in Japan now carries them, and Sonic expanded its hot dog selection this past summer.
Portland has its own selection of bougie hot dogs, from the breakfast dog at OP Wurst to the kimchi dog at Kim Jong Grillin'. Portland Monthly and The Oregonian both declared 2015 the Year of the Hot Dog. (WW said it probably wasn't, and high-profile hot doggeries like Clutch and Hop Dog shuttered within a year of opening.)
But Parsons is banking on a full hot dog experience that can't be had elsewhere.
"There's quick-service hamburger spots, but there's not that second-level hot dog place," he says. "That's what we want to be."
For the past eight months, Spike's has served up grass-fed dogs from Pendleton's Hill Meat Company topped with grilled onions, alongside a 50-deep condiment bar, where you can top your hot dog with everything from Chicago neon-green relish and bacon bits to eight kinds of mustard or even Jif peanut butter. Skip the tater tots ($2.50), which are baked instead of deep-fried, and stick with the dogs. Each variety costs $6.25, with four vegetarian dog options that include apple sage and Tofurky Polish, and is served on a mild sourdough bun from local bakery Jensen's Bread. But really, you're paying for full use of that gigantic condiment bar.
I topped my dog with garlic, Dijon mustard, shredded cheddar cheese and bacon bits. And though it tasted like nearly every hot dog I've had in my life—albeit with better toppings—I didn't end up thinking about Upton Sinclair's The Jungle the way I usually do. The dog, along with Parson's surprising hospitality, left me feeling both nostalgic and a little confused.
Spike's feels out of place, like a piece of the Midwest dropped in the middle of the city, across from Portland's busiest food-cart pod. The restaurant's aesthetics are in direct opposition to the classic brass-and-hardwood luxury of the establishments Parsons built his career on, but also to the Scandinavian minimalism that characterizes new Portland cafes.
Like a restaurant straight out of Disney World, Spike's has red vinyl booths, a sterile white tile floor and is painted with red and yellow stripes. Its menus are covered in Microsoft WordArt-style bright-green block letters with slogans like "HAVE SOME FUN" and "UNIQUE IS GOOD." And Parsons can't shake off his affable Old World hospitality, treating customers with the decorum of an upscale club manager. Each man is "sir," each woman "ma'am."
Parsons says he sees his customers the same way he did at the Benson.
"There were six presidential visits when I was at the Benson, and countless celebrities," he says. "I don't know that the sincerity of response has been any less than the response anywhere else I've worked. To have hot dogs and this place—it makes people happy."
Spike's Hot Dogs, 900 SW Alder St., spikeshotdogs.com, 11 am-8 pm Saturday-Wednesday, 11:30 am-8 pm Thursday-Friday.