As you sit down to a table full of wings, chips, burgers and dips this SuperBowl Sunday, imagine being able to devour truck loads of these delicious items as a profession. Glamor, prestige & unlimited wet naps could be yours right?

Meet Crazy Legs Conti;  a man with one lofty goal in life. His dream? To one day become the epitome of guilt free gluttony by ruling the world of competitive eating circuits in the Good Old U S of A.

Years ago when the Fox network was starved for ratings (pun intended) and didn’t have twenty nights of American Idol programming, they would slap just about anything on the air. This was a magic time for lowest common denominator programming as “When Animals Attack”, “When Good Pets Go Bad” and “Man VS. Beast” flourished.

One of the last straws to break the good will camels back via this genre onslaught for Fox was the Glutton Bowl. A reality game show sanctioned  by the International Federation of Competitive Eating.  Let’s be honest here; any organization that has a soft serve cone as part of their official crest is too legit to quit.

Each episode was bulging with professional eaters being challenged to down whatever was placed in front of them. Butter. Miracle Whip, Vienna Sausages, Hobos.

Ok, ok I kid; there weren’t any competitions that involved Vienna Sausages.

While the Glutton Bowl only lasted as a two hour marathon of excess one classy night, mostly for concern that a regular series would result in the majority of repeat contestants dying from blocked arteries, the good old Yankee tradition of eating ones self to death carried forward with unwavering enthusiasm.

Crazy Legs’ journey to become a spokesperson for the world of competitive eating is not a pretty one my friends. That being said, it’s hard not to like this amiable scarfer and his die hard,  East meets West philosophy as it applies to the honed craft of consuming mass quantities of food in horrifyingly short amounts of time. He wields the same passion of any other seasoned athlete, who can inhale fourteen dozen oysters in under ten minutes.

You’ll feel little guilt as you cheer Conti on in his quest as he possesses a superhuman kind of freakish Jughead metabolism that keeps him comfortably away from obesity. A trait that the majority of champion human Hoovers seem to be blessed with.

Just to give you a better idea of what kind of sweet cash you can make with such a lucrative career path,  Crazy Legs makes ends meet by washing windows, posing nude for art classes and sharing a 20 square foot apartment with a surly Art student who seems to semi tolerate his non-stop binging practice sessions.

Travel with Conti to every backwoods, blue collar, get stabbed in an alleyway eating event as he crisscrosses the Country looking to build his reputation at regional events. His eye on the prize? First place at the Nathan’s Hot Dog eating contest. The culmination of the contests of speed and minimal chewing build to an epic showdown between Crazy Legs & his only true competition; 112 pound Champ Takeru Kobayash.

Kobayashi can eat one hotdog every 12 seconds with a patented double break and water soak approach. Once properly drenched in liquid, it’s argued if he actually chews the hot-dog but instead swallows them whole much like a boa constrictor. However a bit faster and with far less grace. In fact, watching a long line of grown, sweaty men stuff themselves silly with wet buns and tube steak is sometimes hard to watch.

Does Crazy Legs stand a chance?

A thoroughly enjoyable documentary that allows you a very unglamorous at times, inside look at the world of competitive eating. Crazy Legs deliciously enthusiastic passion for what he considers a legitimate sport makes for a fascinating view. It’ll leave you craving more.

Hot Dogs? Not so much.

We’ve all been there – sitting around a campfire, lounging on seldom-used patio furniture at somebody’s grad party, or kneeling awkwardly on a picnic blanket. Family and friends are chatting, children are laughing, dogs are barking, but the only thing that holds our focus is right in front of us…the dreaded last bite of a hot dog.  Due to a critical lack of communication between the hot dog and hot dog bun industries, our “hot dog” at this point is nothing but a cream puff-sized poof of white bread dotted with ketchup (and maybe a few bits of chili or relish) We find ourselves faced with a tough choice: do we eat it or throw it away?

What do you do, So Good readers? Do you shrug and pop the little bit of bun into your mouth, or throw it disdainfully onto your baked beans-smeared paper plate? When you come to that last bite of a hot dog, do you eat it or throw it away?

If you didn’t grill on Memorial Day, then what is your favorite grilled food? Are you a typical hot-dog-and-hamburgers grill master? Or hungry for a fire-blasted, smoky steak? Maybe you have more herbivorous tendencies, and like grilled corn or pineapple. Do you pair veggies with shrimp on a kabob? Do you get fancy with grilled pizza? What do you grill, So Good readers? Vote on your favorite grilled item below and explain in the comments.

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

With all these meat-shunning Fridays going around, it can be easy to forget about the red-blooded, all-American food staple. I know it’s lent, but for now leave your fish fryers dormant and don your protein caps because now it’s time to do some fiercely loyal regional hot dog style voting.

These choices are taken from Sonic’s four new recent hot dog releases (pictured above). Slashfood describes them as:

…the All-American Dog has ketchup, mustard, relish, and chopped raw onions (386 calories); the Chili Cheese Coney is topped with chili and shredded cheddar cheese (420 calories); the New York Dog has spicy mustard, grilled onions, and sauerkraut (352 calories); and the Chicago Dog is topped with a pickle spear, relish, tomatoes, hot peppers, chopped raw onions, celery salt, and mustard, with poppy seeds on the bun (435 calories).

Read more: http://www.slashfood.com/2011/03/07/sonics-new-hot-dogs-reviewed/#ixzz1HtcYpQrR

What’s it going to be, So Good readers? Do you have an inbred aversion to putting ketchup on your dog? A hatred of sauerkraut? Or maybe a hot dog style that’s all your own? Vote and share your thoughts on hot dog styles in the comments section below.

Onions, relish, tomatoes, mustard, peppers, a pickle spear, and naturally, tiger blood, aka Sriracha hot sauce.

What, no sprinkling of Adonis DNA, an essence of warlock, a dash of bi-winning, or a seven-gram rock of the drug, also called “Charlie Sheen”?  Too bad.

I hope the combination doesn’t turn the inside of the frank into Patton Oswalt’s Twitter assessment:

The inside of Charlie Sheen’s urethra must look like Willy Wonka’s boat ride.

That’s not, duh, winning.

H/t to TMZ for the photo at top.

The two second prizes go to Gregg for really being the only one to offer up a “worst” experience with a hot dog (and an amusing one at that), and to rossitron for most interesting use of condiments.  I just e-mailed you guys to get your addresses to send out the prizes.

As readers of So Good know, Sonic seems to come up more frequently than your average chain here. Whether it is me lamenting its infuriating decision to run national ads while not building stores in my area, noting it is one of the top ten QSR’s by sales revenue or Sonic making the final three of our Fast Food Bracket – it always seems to enter the discussion more than other chains of its size.  Well now Sonic wants to remind So Good readers that they are running out of time to try the new(ish) Sonic footlong quarter pound Chili Cheese Coney. That’s right, this bad boy is only available till August 29th:

While dudes on Coney Island websites argue with themselves and Wikipedia over the “real” definition of a Coney Island dog, other people who love fast food a little too much have taken to YouTube, like this dude who crushes a Coney Dog in his car for a video review, or this lady who proclaims “that’s the one.” Now I have no review of the Coney Dog myself, because Sonic still refuses to build a store in the DC area, but that’s probably for the best, because while I can enjoy a good chili-cheese half-smoke at a ballgame, I generally don’t care much for hot dogs overall. What I am a fan of (usually) is Sonic’s commercials, and the latest ad for the Coney Dog does a great job poking fun at a competitor, Subway:

So if you want to try a Sonic footlong chili-cheese Coney Dog, get your butt to a Sonic soon, because they are available for $2.99 only until August 29th.  But before you do that, I must ask, are you a fattie? Do you eat too much fast food already? Because if so, you might want to check yourself before you wreck yourself: this bad boy clocks in at 810 calories with 53 g of fat and 22 g of saturated fat – more than 100% of your recommended saturated fat allowance for a full day.

And what’s that about baseball tickets and Sonic gift cards you say? That’s right, the folks at Sonic want to hook it up, so here’s what we have to offer:

One Grand Prize:  four (4) tickets to a local MLB/AAA baseball game
(transportation not included) and a $25 MySONIC Gift Card

Two Second Prizes:  A $25 MySONIC Gift Card for two readers to visit their
local SONIC Drive-In

Sweet! In the comments share a fun/horrifying memory about the best/worst/weirdest hot dog you’ve ever had. The best comments/memories, as determined by me, will win the prizes. And don’t write a novel.  Believe it or not I have things to do with my life besides read 9 paragraph comments to my food blog.  You have till Saturday at 9 am EST to leave a comment to enter to win. Have at it peeps.

The hot dog industry was placed under the spotlight this past Monday when the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommended that hot dog makers change the shape of the tubular food item in order to be less of a choking hazard for kids.  The recommendation also targeted “hard candy, whole grapes, raw carrots, peanut butter, chewing gum, marshmallows, peanuts/nuts, popcorn and sausages.” 

Now, I am as much against kids choking to death as the next guy, but come on – tube-shaped foods are popular because mouths are round and they are easier to eat.  Round peg, meet round hole.  Hot dogs, brats, sausages, subs (grinders to the NE crowd), burritos, enchiladas, popsicles, etc. are all cylindrical, and mighty tasty.  Should they be redesigned because they are a potentially dangerous? – No.  OK, so kids eat hot dogs more than the other foods – solution: either don’t buy hot dogs for kids (also preventing childhood obesity – a plus), or cut them up!  Problem solved.  The same thinking applies to all the other foods that the AAP is warning people against.  Let’s all use a little common sense here so that we don’t have to enjoy government-mandated hot dog shakes at the next ball game (extra kraut in mine).

Speaking of the ball game, choking is not the only danger posed by wieners, as seen at a Kansas City Royals game last season here.

H/t to Ben’s Chili Bowl for the hot dog porn.  Obama loves it!

So what’s the deal with this meat monstrosity? Archie McPhee describes what you get for your $79.95 investment:

Our bestselling Hot Dog Hideaway kit comes with enough cured deli slices and kosher dogs (Over 10 pounds!) to make a veritable McMansion of meat! Just follow the included blueprints and use the pate spackle to join it together and smooth over the rough edges. Not only will you get the complete Hot Dog Hideaway, but also a set of meat landscaping materials to make pimento loaf trees and meatball bushes.

Yummy. My favorite part of the description?

Note: This kit will only remain edible for three weeks without refrigeration.

ONLY three weeks? ONLY? We are talking about 10 pounds of meat here.  Shouldn’t the shelf life be even less than that?

The Sara Lee suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago, says the ad is false and misleading because in large type it implies one Oscar Mayer dog bested the taste of all Ball Park dogs. But the footnote, “in very small type,” says that Oscar Mayer compared its hot dogs to “the leading beef franks” of its main rivals.

H/t to Peta2 for the photo above of someone you will not find on OM’s YouTube channel.

Huh? A hot dog vending machine? On the one hand I’m sure you’re thinking that sounds disgusting, but c’mon, is a hot dog really any less processed and full of preservatives than anything else you’d get out of a vending machine? So how does this new fangled contraption work?

The Hot Nosh vending machine will be under the supervision of the KOF-K kosher certification agency. It sears and cooks the refrigerated hot dogs using a special infrared heating element and warms the buns before dropping them into a Styrofoam container.

Styrofoam? Really? Really? So this company is all about helping people adhere to a strict dietary code, but they can’t be bothered to stop using a material that puts holes in the ozone layer?

Seriously though, a vending machine hot dog? I implore each and every Boston based So Good reader: please, please head over to Fenway and send me some pictures/reports about this vending machine. How does an infrared heated kosher hot dog from a vending machine taste? How does the machine work? Is it a machine devoted totally to hot dogs, or does it look like the machine above, with a variety of foods? Can you see the hot dog being made in front of you? Or does it just pop out of a slot at the bottom?