My in-laws hail from a small town in Northern New York just across from Burlington on Lake Champlain and about an hour South of Montreal. I had never visited this part of the world until recently, but one thing that I have always heard them talk about was their regional style of hot dog called the Michigan. It was always kind of a mystery to me. I had been served a homemade version of it once before and it seemed like a regular chili dog to me.

So, when I visited for the first time this Easter Weekend, I set out on a crazy mission to taste all of them in the city and find my favorite. Along the way I would try to figure out exactly what a Michigan is, what makes them different than a chili dog, and what makes certain Michigans stand out from others. As a bonus, it would give me something fun to talk about with my wife’s family.

I’ve had a lot of regional styles of hot dogs. Whether it is the Dodger Dog in Los Angeles, a dragged-through-the-garden style Chicago dog, NYC dogs with red onion sauce, bacon-wrapped and fried dogs from Arizona, or the cream cheese covered dogs from Seattle. I even come from a place where sweet mayonnaise-based cole slaw is not only a normal hot dog topping, but it is considered essential to a good dog by a lot of people around me growing up (they are right, by the way).

Going into this, I wasn’t really sure what a Michigan was. I thought it might be related to the Coney Island style that is famous in the Detroit area, and people all around said it was all about the sauce — which is sauce not chili.

I wanted the search to be fair, so I made a 25 point grading system that was made up of the five categories below with a possible score of 5 points in each category.

Appearance- the Michigans should look nice. I was going to be taking pictures of all of them so I wanted something that was shareable for the article that I planned to eventually write.

Dog Quality- How good was the actual hot dog? I came to found out that there is a regional style of dog called the Glazier that was the gold standard. Glaziers made the perfect score, but a dog with nice flavor and a good snap would also take high points.

Sauce Quality- Having heard it’s all about the sauce, this had to be its own category. I like a good spice to mine. I found out that texture was also important. The sauce should be a lot thinner and looser than a typical chili, with a very fine crumble of beef.

Overall Taste- This was how well the whole Michigan worked together. The flavors should compliment each other and really let the sauce stand out. The only acceptable toppings for a Michigan are onions and mustard, and you can get them “buried” with mustard and onions on the bottom if you ask. This seemed like they way to go, so this was the style that I ordered at each restaurant. The bun was important here too. It should be soft but hold up to all of the sauce. There was definitely a local style of bun that took top honors here. It is slit on the side and cradles the dog just right.

Ambiance- This is a really important category to me. The best regional hot dogs are sold in stands that are local landmarks. I want a place that specializes in Michigans. They should have a casual atmosphere, friendly service, simple decor, and a certain feeling of timelessness.

Below you’ll find all of the stops and notes that I made. I ended up eating thirteen Michigans from eight different places in five days. I started with only a couple of stops on my list, but every time I told someone about what I was doing they mentioned that they had somewhere else that I needed to try. Also, I made a rule that if I was already somewhere and saw Michigans on the menu, I would be obligated to have one. I’ll put them in order from worst to best to build the anticipation.

Note: This was a terrible idea. No one should live off of these for five days. The look on my vegetarian spouse’s face as I had my fifth or sixth Michigan in a day was always disgust. I’m not sure that I’ll be able to eat another hot dog for the rest of the year.