Speed’s: Best Hot Dog in the U.S.

We’re beginning to feel a little smug around here at Chowder Central. For the second time this month, a Boston eatery has been named “best in the country” (that’s after the New York Times’s Frank Bruni named O Ya the best new American restaurant). Hah!

In this case it’s Speed’s Hot Dogs, the Newmarket Square stand where franks are marinated in apple cider and brown sugar, grilled over charcoal, then topped with homemade condiments. Raymond Sokolov of the Wall Street Journal calls them “the dog[s] against which I now measure all others.”

Congratulations to the Speed’s team, led by octogenarian owner Ezra “Speed” Anderson. You’re a top dog, indeed.