We have a winner: The Triangle’s top hot dog is an underdog tale built on simplicity

The Triangle’s Hot Dog Bracket is a real underdog story.

After 16 hot dog shops were collected, voters considered the best hot dogs from Chapel Hill to Clayton, narrowing the list down until the final pitted the Raleigh institution The Roast Grill against North Raleigh’s Steve’s Place Deli. And with 71% of the final vote, Steve’s Place is the top dog in the Triangle.

Call it a calling, call it fate, the owner of Steve’s Place believes the magic starts with the name.

“My last name is Weiner,” said Steve Weiner. “It could be destiny.”

Steve Weiner calls himself Steve 2.0. The original owner of Steve’s Place is Steve Daniels, a retired Raleigh police officer who ran the hot dog shop from 2000 to 2019, when it was sold to Weiner. There were a few changes in the transition, the addition of all-day breakfast, of a larger sandwich menu, but the heart and soul remained on the bun.

“We’re really known for the hot dogs,” Weiner said.

Steve’s Place is a strip mall hot dog stand that’s built a two-decade following. There are no seats indoors, just a counter to order from.

Weiner has spent his career working in restaurants and convenience stores, first in his native New Jersey and more recently in the Triangle, moving down in 2009 to manage a truck stop in Johnston County, then local Taco Bell locations.

Then in 2019 he was looking to run something of his own. That’s when he found Steve’s Place, which had already built a community of hot dog fans in North Raleigh.

“I love Raleigh, I love it down here, there’s a great food scene,” Weiner said. “There are a lot of foodies. But the working class guy can get overlooked when these cities explode. Growth is great, but there are less and less places offering blue collar food.”

Steve’s Place: Hot dogs never go out of style

The hot dogs are Steve’s Place come any way you want them. There are Brightleaf reds and Nathan’s Famous beef hot dogs, 11 toppings and any preparation diners prefer. They come boiled, griddled and Weiner said they’ll even throw them in a deep fryer.

“For a little texture,” he said.

Weiner said he had never seen a red hot dog until he moved down to North Carolina. To him a hot dog was a Nathan’s beef foot-long with a red onion sauce on it.

“Here people will say, ‘Give me two regular hot dogs,’” Weiner said. “But regular depends on where you’re from. It could be beef or it could be pork. If someone asks for a regular hot dog, I tell our workers to listen for the accent.”

Weiner said hot dogs will never go out of style, that a grilled wiener is a memory countless people share, a lifetime connection with a squirt of mustard.

“I think it’s the common denominator,” Weiner said. “Whatever your background, however you were raised, you probably had hot dogs growing up, putting them on sticks over the fire, cookouts on Memorial Day. We don’t agree on much, but hot dogs are a constant thing.”

After calling North Carolina home for more than a decade, Weiner said he’s seen Raleigh’s growth change the food landscape, embracing trends and styles of fast casual that often mean higher prices. He said Steve’s Place aims to be a fixture for everyone.

“It’s just kind of common food for normal people,” Weiner said. “We are blue collar, we have a lot of regulars. It’s a dying breed kind of place, a takeout place. We don’t have chocolate souffles or red potatoes. It’s a hot dog, it’s three bucks. You can put seven toppings on it and it’s three bucks. We keep it simple.”

Runner up: The Roast Grill

Over time, The Roast Grill’s stance on ketchup has softened somewhat. You are now permitted to bring in your own, should you wish to disgrace your hot dog, and possibly yourself, with such a condiment. Owner George Poniros said the 82-year-old lunch counter’s famous anti-ketchup philosophy came from his grandmother, Mary Charles.

“People would want ketchup and she would make kind of a clucking, tsking sound and shake her fork at them and say ‘No ketchup,’” Poniros said. “The reason is she spent so much time making the chili — a day and a half — and you don’t taste the full flavor of the chili if you cover it in ketchup.”

The Roast Grill, one of Raleigh’s oldest restaurants and one of the state’s most famous hot dog counters, is the runner-up in the Triangle Hot Dog Bracket, but it is no one’s silver medal.

Poniros’ grandparents started the restaurant in 1940, serving a larger menu that included pork chops and stews and green beans, but quickly narrowed the focus to hot dogs.

Poniros has been running the Roast Grill for the past 30 years, watching the modest 12-seat counter ascend into an icon. He said there’s no secret to it’s magic, it’s simply a matter of caring.

“It’s bothering to grill (the hot dogs), it’s finding the best wiener you can find, it’s the atmosphere, it’s one of a kind,” Poniros said. “We try to make every single one of our toppings. We don’t make a mediocre anything.”

The Roast Grill wieners come from Michigan, the chili is a 100-year-old recipe, the slaw is coarsely chopped cabbage that used to mean a quarter upcharge, which patrons were happy to pay. The drinks are Coke and domestic bottles of beer. The hot dogs themselves slowly blacken and burn on the Roast Grill’s flattop, cooked up a couple feet away from the counter full of diners. Dessert is a couple miniature Tootsie Rolls.

It’s a hot dog, but it’s also an experience.

“It’s a hot dog you can eat and actually enjoy and say it’s delicious,” Poniros said. “I’ll do it as long as I can walk.”