For my second visit to Huntington (non-worked related, which was once), I indulged in the Hot Dog Festival. In fact, this was the only reason I went to Huntington. This is the only reason I go most places.

So the Hot Dog Festival had a handful of vendors: Stewarts Original Hot Dogs, Frostop Drive Inn, Midway Drive-In, Sam’s Hot Dogs, Charlie’sHarley Davidson Diner, Down Home Salads, and The Jug & Kilt English Pub.

I don’t really know what that last half are, so I focused my efforts on the top four and prepared my stomach.

For not knowing Huntington at all, I, remarkably, did not get lost and also found parking. For the whole day festival, I only paid $3 in parking for a garage that was RIGHT THERE.

The very first hotdog I knew I wanted to try was Stewarts. I’m told that is iconic Huntington, so I didn’t want to risk running out of room before I tried it. Luckily, the area where my friend an I entered was right near Stewarts.

I ordered one dog - $2 – with chili, slaw, mustard and onions. They only fix the hotdog with chili and you supply the rest of the toppings (they also had ketchup available) from canisters on a communal table.

I wasn’t sure how I felt about this for a number of reasons:

1 – This was me creating my own hotdog, so unless they do this at their restaurant, too, I didn’t feel as though I was fully evaluating their product.

2 – It was a little warm out, and these canisters were just sitting in the sunlight. I imagine slaw could go bad?

3 – I don’t like the idea of communal toppings. I don’t know what those people did to those toppings before I got there. They were just in canisters that were haphazardly closed or open, and it was just messy.

When eating the hotdog, I was thinking “Okay, this isn’t bad.” I’m glad it was my first, because it got increasingly better as I went along. This was an average hotdog. The sauce didn’t have a lot of flavor and was just overall blah.

Grade: C

After watching some contests and perusing the shops, we tried our second hotdog: Midway Drive-In.

“One with chili, slaw, mustard and onions, please.”

“We’re out of slaw.”

“WHAT?!”

“You should’ve came earlier.”

“WHAT! How can you serve hotdogs without slaw? This is West Virginia!”

“No slaw. Sorry.”

The hotdog was better than Stewarts – even though it didn’t have slaw. Still a notch above with slightly better tasting chili, and the toppings were fresher.

Grade: B

Okay getting full. One more before we go: Sam’s.

I have had Sam’s before in Charleston, so it was probably #4 out of the ones I wanted to try, but my friend and I saw Frostop coming to the festival, so we figured we could actually just go and sit there and save the festival for another one.

All of the hotdogs at this place were $2, so I asked for one standard. My friend was the last person to get chili. They had to shut down after us. What is it with these places running out of food? There were still a couple hours of the festival left to go!

But I have to say, Sam’s nailed it.

Bun was steamed right. Sauce was the most flavorful, and toppings were fresh and cold.

Grade: A

Before we left Huntington, we took another lap or two around the festival and headed out. By this time, our three hotdogs had digested and we could take on a fourth. So we stopped at Frostop.

You can’t miss it. It has a giant, rotating root beer on the top.

I pulled up, and clearly you are supposed to know what you want when you do this. As soon as I parked, a waiter – is that what they’re called? – came over to my car and asked what we wanted. I told him I have no clue. He told me I could pull up to the menu.

So I did. #awk.

Looking over the menu at the front of the building, I decided on one hotdog and a rootbeer float. You actually have to pay extra for slaw. I then asked if we could sit outside. I didn’t want to eat inside my car. They have a few benches.

I was seriously not following drive inn protocol. Forgive my ignorance.

After a bit, he came back with our food and a bill with change already made. He anticipated me paying with a $5. Which was presumptuous and slightly confusing. But I made it work, somehow.

If you’re reading this, sorry, dude. Did NOT mean to make your job difficult. I’m just stupid, or something.

Hotdog was good. To be honest, it wasn’t as memorable as the root beer float.

Ahhhhmmmmmm.

So good. I don’t even like root beer. It doesn’t taste generic or all those other awful things pop can sometimes taste like. It was smooth and refreshing and amazing.

And good GOD. Delicious. Get one of those root beer floats, and you can thank me later.

But the hotdog? Eh. Just get two root beer floats.

Grade: B

Legendary King Tut Drive-In, located in Beckley, opened in the 1940s and is one of the few drive-ins left in the state. Originally owned by the Tuckwiler Family, who named the drive-in, John McKay purchased the restaurant in 1955, and it has been in the family ever since.



Current owner Dave McKay remembers when his father, John, now 93, came back from an annual food show in Chicago with the idea to sell pizza, which was unheard of in the area at that time.

"He developed our own sauce recipe, and we still have that recipe today," said Dave, who took partial ownership of the business in 2004, along with his brother Jeff McKay and step-brother Loren Rice. "At first, nobody wanted it; we tried to give it away!"



Today, though, that unique recipe is a signature of King Tut's, and folks return for that same authentic taste they grew up with.

"I've got customers who still know Dad, and they've been here for a long time. They eat the same thing. They'll notice a change in a recipe. For example, our base tomato sauce company was bought out, and a new company took over. The label was the same on the sauce, but the formula was different, and we didn't know. For the first few pizzas, we got calls like 'what the heck did you do?', and the company had to go back to the original formula. People notice that," Dave said.

King Tut continues to deliver many homemade dishes, including breads, pies, many soups, chili and more. "We can do that - chain restaurants can't. We love being able to provide homecooked options on the menu - people love it."



The restaurant sells everything fromsandwiches and wraps to pizzas and full dinners - like meatloaf, pot roast andfish. With a huge variety, Dave says the trick is to have a lot of the same ingredients for multiple items so that they can keep a varied menu with fresh ingredients in order to keep the people coming.

Most of the customers who frequent King Tut Drive-In are return customers. About 80 percent have been to the restaurant multiple times over the years, then there are the customers who call in on a regular basis for lunches, and some new customers who are passing through town or hear about King Tut's through word of mouth, Dave said.



But many customers prefer the traditional curbside service, where they can order a pizza or dinner plate and have it delivered via a tray attached to the side of the car. For many, it may be the nostalgia; for others, it’s a new experience.

While King Tut is the last of three drive-in restaurants standing in Beckley, it has had to compete with newer fast-food restaurants and sit-down restaurants in the area.



"For us, in the '60s cruising around, we drove from one restaurant to another. That was our social life. I spent most of my time at the other two drive-ins because I didn't want to see dad," Dave laughed. "But the biggest change to the industry is just the change that came into town. We just added five new restaurants down the road. We used to be the one place to go out and socialize; the curb would be full of cars until 1 a.m. But now, people go home early and don't spend so much time out. Half of our business is take-out, and we used to have almost no take-out."

"We still do the same volume. We just do it in big peak hours for lunch and dinner. Socialization habits have changed - there are more things for them to do besides sit out here and date. The word is changing around us, and we keep trying to feed them good food."

Top-sellers include their BBQ, which has won multiple awards, as well as their hotdogs in English buns, baked stuffed potatoes and coconut cream pies. All of which are served by the curb girls - many of whom have been at King Tut for more than 15 years, which helps with the consistency, Dave said.

"They know how the business has been run and the right way to do it. And they work with the employees, which are about 23 total, to make sure things are done the right way. They'll threaten, 'John McKay didn't make it that way!' if not," Dave said.

"We keep it going is because of the demand from community," Dave said. "I got 23 people who depend on it for a living, and I have a community who demands the food. We have a lot of people who rave about the place. Those are the people who keep the place in business. I'd be easy to bulldoze over and start again - we are dealing with an ancient facility after all, but we have pretty happy customers, so we're going to keep feeding them."



King Tut Dive-In is located at 301 N. Eisenhower Drive. It is open from 10:30 a.m. to 11 p.m. and closed on Wednesdays. King Tut Drive-In can be reached at (304) 252-6353.

PS - I did get a chance to try their pizza - unique, but tasty! It's a bit of a thicker crust, with little crispy pepperonis, but it's kind of a regional classic. Can't go wrong.

Grade: A